The launch was a “gift” to residents of both countries and one that they had been “eagerly” awaiting, says Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who officiated at the ceremony with Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.
On Feb 21, managing director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) Ravi Menon and Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor Shaktikanta Das, each in their respective countries, made almost immediate cross-border payments from their smartphones.
The transactions were executed live at the launch of the linkage between Singapore’s PayNow and India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) between MAS and RBI, and were completed in less than a minute — comfortably outperforming the central banks’ conservative estimate of up to five minutes to complete each payment.
