Bank of America and JPMorgan Join Swift's New Cross-Border Payment Framework

Four months after Swift floated its new cross-border payment framework, bank adoption is starting to roll in. Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase are among an initial group of about 60 banks in 25 countries adopting the framework, which is designed largely for smaller transactions such as remittances, near-real-time settlement and a transaction tracker, American Banker reported Tuesday.

What's New

The framework includes a fixed fee as an alternative to the variable rates charged by correspondent banks, and greater transparency, speed and predictability for customers. It uses Swift's existing network — which connects more than 11,000 banks — to tie parties together in a transaction. This allows a cross-border payment to look and feel a bit more like a local payment, said AJ McCray, head of global payments products at Bank of America.

The Digital-Asset Angle

The adoption comes as stablecoins and fintech-issued digital currencies pressure the international payments market. Swift is also suggesting tokenized deposits — commercial bank money on distributed-ledger infrastructure — as a digital currency option banks may favor over stablecoins. Tokenized commercial bank money gives banks a pragmatic path to introduce new digital capabilities without moving away from well-understood and regulated deposit models, Swift said. About 40 percent of banks are either live or in some form of development of a blockchain-powered cross-border payment product, according to an American Banker analysis.

Stablecoins totaled $135 billion of the roughly $44 trillion in cross-border payments in 2025 — just 0.31 percent — leaving both sides arguing over which rail will scale. For now, the Swift initiative gives consumers clearer visibility into when funds will arrive and what they will cost, said J.P. Morgan Payments' Andrew Smith-Plenderleith, while time will tell how stablecoins win the trust of treasurers and CFOs.