The Federal Reserve Board proposed amending Regulation J Subpart C on April 8, 2026. The amendment would allow FedNow participants to use intermediary banks other than Reserve Banks to send payments through the service. This change would permit FedNow to process cross-border payment flows for the first time. The proposal mirrors the intermediary bank framework Fedwire has used for decades.
The Clearing House's RTP network reached its On-Behalf-Of compliance deadline on April 16. All RTP participants must now identify both the actual payer and the sending platform using legal names in payment messages. The rules prohibit participants from presenting cross-border payments as domestic transactions. The Clearing House may require third-party audits to verify compliance with OBO requirements.
The two systems serve different institutional bases. FedNow has grown to more than 1,700 participating financial institutions. RTP launched in November 2017. The network has over 1,200 participants. RTP processed more than $1.3 trillion in 2025. An earlier cross-border initiative, the IXB pilot connecting RTP with EBA CLEARING's RT1 for USD-EUR instant transfers, was paused in 2023 over policy and regulatory challenges.
Neither development constitutes an immediate launch of cross-border services. The comment period for FedNow's Regulation J proposal closes on June 9, 2026.