(Yicai Global) May 31 -- China's yuan remained the fifth most-used currency in global payments last month, with its share falling slightly to 1.88 percent from 1.89 percent in March.

This was according to a report the La Hulpe, Belgium-based Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication released on its public WeChat account today.

The volume of payments in yuan -- also known as renminbi – last month dropped by 23 percent from the figure for March

The US dollar, the euro and the UK pound ranked top three in payment amounts in April with 40.76 percent 33.16 percent and 7.11 percent; followed by Japan's yen which placed at 3.47 percent The Canadian dollar the Hong Kong dollar and the Australian dollar limped in from sixth to eighth with 18.4 percent 16.1 percent and 13.8 percent, respectively, per the data.

Disregarding transfers made within the eurozone itself, the US dollar the euro the yen and the pound were still in the top four in the payment activity index of customer and institutional disbursements, claiming 47.02 percent 31.72 percent 41.9 percent and 41.1 percent; while fifth to seventh place went to the Canadian dollar at 23.4 percent, the Swiss franc with 15.1 percent and the Australian dollar at 13.6 percent.

The redback did not budge from its spot the year before, placing eighth again with a share of 1.20 percent.

SWIFT runs a network that lets financial institutions worldwide exchange information about transactions in a standardized, secure and reliable manner. It also vends services and software for use on its SWIFTNet network. Its Business Identifier Codes are commonly called 'SWIFT codes.'

Most international interbank messages use SWIFT, which had over 11,000 financial institutions in more than 200 countries participating by 2015, swapping over 32 million messages each day, up from 2.4 million in 1995. SWIFT does not hold member accounts or do any settlement or clearing.

Editor: Ben Armour