Africa’s largest bank by asset base, Standard Bank, processed transactions worth RMB3.39 billion ($500 million) in the four months to February 2026, having gone live with the China’s Cross-border Interbank Payment System (CIPS) on November 20, 2025.

 

The Johannesburg-based lender was granted the licence to offer CIPS transactions in June 2025 in Shanghai, China, before going live three months later in a move aimed at meeting the growing demand for diversification away from the US dollar and the Euro in global trade and payments settlement.

Through its onboarding onto CIPS, Standard Bank is eyeing the vast $277.2 billion total trade flows between China and Africa, of which $178.6 billion is attributable to China’s exports to Africa while $98.6 billion is attributable to Africa’s exports to China.“In November 2025, we became the first African bank to be admitted to China’s Cross-border Interbank Payment System and have processed half a billion US dollar worth of Renminbi transactions in our first four months alone. In practice, this means that an African manufacturer buying inputs from China no longer needs to route that payment through US dollars or Euros, paying correspondent banking fees and bearing currency risk,” Standard Bank’s Chief Executive for Africa Regions and Offshore, Lungisa Fuzile, said at the third edition of the Africa Unlocked Summit in Cape Town, on Thursday.

African economies have been accelerating efforts to wean themselves off reliance on the US dollar for payments ever since the acute shortage of the green buck that dominated the period between 2023 and 2024 as the US Federal Reserve hiked its policy rate to tame high inflation and triggered massive dollar outflows from frontier and emerging markets.

In 2025, Kenya re-denominated its $6 billion standard gauge railway loan from US dollar to RMB as part of the country’s board liability management efforts that are designed to re-profile external debt and free up fiscal space in the wake of elevated debt pressures.

Following the redenomination, Kenya’s debt redemption to China in 2026/27 will stand at $554.8 million, 8.5 percent lower than the amount paid in 2024/25, while its interest payments to China will stand at $223.3 million, 11.9 percent lower than the amount paid in 2024/25.

The yuan clearing status means that Standard Bank has access to China’s onshore financial system, including capital markets, liquidity and payment solutions.

The bank’s Chief Executive for Business and Commercial, William Blackie, described their partnership with the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China as “important,” saying what matters is not only the currency mechanism but what that access makes possible."One can open Renminbi accounts and settle payments more efficiently with Chinese suppliers and reduce friction as they engage in trade,” Mr Blackie said.

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