That system, System for Transfer of Financial Messages (SPFS), is not only now functioning in Russia, according to a report from RT it now handles the financial transfer data for more than half of Russia's institutions.

According to Anatoly Aksakov, head of the Russian parliamentary committee on financial markets:

The number of users of our internal financial messages' transfer system is now greater than that of those using SWIFT. We're already holding talks with China, Iran and Turkey, along with several other countries, on linking our system with their systems," Aksakov said.

"They need to be properly integrated with each other in order to avoid any problems with using the countries' internal financial messaging systems."

This is a follow up to last month's boast by the Russians that their system was seeing a lot of international interest.  How much of this is boast and how much of it is reality remains to be seen, but the important point here is that the minute the U.S. weaponized SWIFT for use in its foreign policy, something like this was bound to occur.