The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe this week sent a circular to banks announcing a multi-currency upgrade. As proposed by Finance Minister Mthuli Ncube, the RTGS platform now include United States Dollar.
The previous system before the upgrade made transferring foreign currency hard. This applies to the use RTGS to transfer from one account to another using the Nostro FCA accounts.
“We advise that the RTGS platforms have been upgraded to include the United States Dollar(USD) to facilitate settlement of USD Nostro FCA transactions,” RBZ Deputy Director, Financial Markets Division J. Mutepfa said.
“The function is now available in the test environment for testing by participating institutions.”
The Deputy Director, Financial Markets Division urged participants to send test messages. As well as, ensure a full circle of the transaction is completed on the Nostro FCA accounts.
“Results of the test should be logged immediately on the attached user acceptance testing form and submitted to the Reserve Bank on a daily basis until Friday 1 February 2019, ” Mutepfa explained to the banks.
“It is expected that the settlement of USD transactions will commence soon there after in the live environment.”
Individuals could not transfer USD using the FCA accounts. While companies used a more expensive way to transact using foreign currency.
Professor Ncube separated accounts into FCA Accounts and the domestic currency accounts.
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