Why in news?

• United States and European nations recently agreed to block select Russian banks from SWIFT.
• Founded in 1973, SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication), a non-listed Belgium-based firm, is actually a cooperative of banks.
• It doesn’t handle any transfers of funds itself but its messaging system provides banks the means to communicate rapidly, securely and inexpensively.
• Banks use the SWIFT system to send standardised messages about transfers of sums between themselves, transfers of sums for clients, and buy and sell orders for assets.
• This measure will ensure that Russian financial institutions are disconnected from the international financial system and harm their ability to operate globally.