To maintain the gold standard, central banks had to promise to exchange actual gold for their paper currencies at the legal rate. The gold standard appeared to be highly successful from about 1870 to the beginning of World War I in 1914.
In addition, some of Australia’s largest banks are now waiving fees on some transactions in the South Pacific corridors. There is a lot more to be done here, and we need the assistance of Australia’s financial institutions to make further improvements. One current issue is the speed of cross-border payments.