Cross-border clearing is undergoing a significant transformation. Corporates and financial institutions are demanding faster settlement, greater transparency and more data to manage liquidity and risk. At the same time, new rails, from instant payment systems to tokenised deposits, are proliferating. Danielle Sharpe, global head of clearing at Standard Chartered, said at Sibos Frankfurt 2025 that the bank aims to be “the partner to help clients win” by combining a large clearing network with investment in instant capabilities, transparent tracking and embedded payments. Speed, last-mile access and direct memberships Sharpe highlighted Standard Chartered’s “huge network of direct clearing memberships” across 40 markets, reducing the need for intermediaries and streamlining connectivity. In its US dollar clearing business in New York, “we are processing 86% of transactions within one hour, faster than the average according to Swift data,” she said, with similar performance in Germany, the United Kingdom and Hong Kong. This reflects an industry shift to treat speed as a differentiator even in correspondent banking, traditionally seen as slow and opaque. Investing in instant capabilities and euro settlement Beyond traditional rails, the bank is focusing on 24/7 or near-instant capabilities for on-book transfers. Over 90% of the world’s largest banks route flows through Standard Chartered, making seven-day-a-week processing “absolutely critical”. The bank is also euro settlement bank for Patior to offer “instantaneous certainty of payments”. These moves position it to handle a future of cross-border instant payments, where treasurers will expect always-on settlement. Transparency and cost certainty Sharpe said transparency is as important as speed. Standard Chartered has invested heavily in Swift’s Global Payments Innovation (GPI) and provides public portals for clients to track payments end-to-end. Products guarantee “full value to the end beneficiary” with upfront foreign exchange (FX) rates, and the bank honours claims to give clients certainty on what to charge their own customers. This combination of speed and predictability helps corporates manage liquidity and pricing — a critical need in volatile markets. Embedding data and APIs for richer insights Transactions are no longer just “pipes” but “rich data events”. Standard Chartered embeds ISO 20022 data into its Straight2Bank digital tools for predictive insights and corridor analysis. Application programming interface (API)-initiated transactions have grown 50% year on year, allowing bank clients to expose payments, reporting confirmations and FX rates downstream to their own customers. Sharpe also highlighted SC Prism FX, which lets corporates lock in guaranteed FX rates for up to a month to reduce exposure to currency volatility. These offerings reflect how clearing banks are moving beyond basic settlement to offer risk management tools. Combining innovation and collaboration Sharpe said demand for multi-currency, multi-market clearing is “clearly growing”. The bank is investing in automation, reconciliation and artificial intelligence while maintaining strong risk management. Collaboration across the industry, she emphasised, is essential because “we can’t serve the world alone” and advisory support has become as important as processing payments. Her remarks underscore a Sibos theme: clearing banks are moving from being invisible intermediaries to strategic partners enabling real-time, data-rich payments.
