PRESS RELEASE - July 20, 2018 - ALMUS NMPG addresses MP for matched leg funds transfers

  Announcements

20 July 2018 

Press Release

 

ALMUS NMPG addresses market practice needs for matched leg investment fund transfers

The Luxembourg investment funds National Market Practice Group (NMPG), known as ALMUS, has published a market practice for the investment funds transfer matched-leg (also known as double or dual leg) process in MyStandards. This includes a process document and message usage guidelines. The market practice document focuses on the transfer of units between two accounts recorded in the legal register of fund holders.

Transfers are generally instructed using physical documents or faxes. As such, they require manual intervention, which makes them resource intensive and exposes them to the risk of human error. Moreover, their processing is usually not time-critical, so they often are not processed with the same urgency as subscriptions, redemptions and switches, leading to delays that can have a knock-on impact on a custodian's ability to service their client effectively. The reasons why transfers are not automated include the lack of a defined market practice at both a local and global market level and different usage of the message standards.

ALMUS acknowledges that whilst all aspects of the market practice may not be appropriate in all markets, the standardisation of the messaging to and from the transfer agent for a matched leg transfer process is achieved with this market practice.

ALMUS is a long term member of the investment funds Securities Market Practice Group (SMPG) and it is hoped this is a stepping stone for the publication of a global market practice.

ALMUS is also working on market practice for a single leg process in which the delivering party only instructs the transfer agent. It is anticipated that this market practice will be aligned with the SMPG IF market practice for single-leg transfer. It should be available in the second half of 2018.

End

 

Information for the Press:

Background on ALMUS Matched Leg Investment Fund Transfers Market Practice:

A number of Luxembourg based transfer agents and their distributors came together under the ALMUS (*1) umbrella to define message usage guidelines for the straight-through processing of investment funds transfers with the transfer agent sitting at the centre matching the ‘in’ and ‘out’ instructions.

The market practice is available on the MyStandards (*2) platform.

To find the market practice, logon to MyStandards:

  • Enter "ALMUS" in the search box >
    • Click on "Groups"
  • Click on " NMPG LU IF ALMUS"
  • The collection is listed: "ALMUS-NMPG-IF-MLT FINAL (2018-07-04) ".
    • Click on the collection name.

This takes you to a screen listing the usage guidelines of the collection. Click on ‘show details’ to get access to the collection description and the documents posted with the collection.

For further information on the ALMUS Matched Leg Transfer Market Practice, contact Janice.Chapman@swift.com and olga.piemontlazzarino@franklintempleton.com

FOOTNOTES:

(*1) ALMUS is the association of the SWIFT members and users in Luxembourg. Market practice work has been undertaken by the Findel Group (*3). All Luxembourg investment funds market practice work is channelled through ALMUS.

(*2) MyStandards (www.swift.com/MyStandards) is a collaborative web platform where banks, securities firms, corporates and market infrastructures can centralise and manage their standards releases and specifications more efficiently across their markets and business processes. MyStandards is an easy to use, online repository for all current and MT, MX and ISO 20022 base standards definitions. It’s also a platform for creating, publishing and sharing specifications and usage guidelines for users and customers to access in a choice of standard formats (PDF, Excel or XML schemas).

(*3) The Findel Group is formed of Asset Managers representing €1.4 trillion of assets under management of the cross border funds industry.(http://findelgroup.com/about-us.html). Recently, the work of The Findel Group has evolved, focusing more on strategic issues, rather than detailed work on market practice and messages usage guidelines and the market practice work is now under the umbrella of ALMUS.

Background on SMPG:

The Securities Market Practice Group was established in July 1998 with a focus on defining market practices for the securities industry based on existing ISO messages for Trade Initiation/Confirmation, Settlements, Reconciliation and Corporate Actions. SMPG’s goal is to provide the community of ISO 15022 and ISO 20022 securities message users with a global market practice on the usage of these messages. SMPG has produced over 30 market practice recommendations using ISO 15022 messages. SMPG has since expanded to define market practices for the Investment Funds industry using the ISO 20022 messages. All market practices are available on www.smpg.info.

SMPG is open to all securities players – through participation in a National Market Practice Group (NMPG) – interested in creating globally-agreed market practices for the securities industry. NMPGs are established in about 40 countries. SMPG is a non-funded industry group that only functions thanks to the dedication and assistance of the local experts active in the NMPGs.

SMPG Contacts:

Chair: Armin Borries (armin.borries@clearstream.com)

Vice-Chair: Rudolf Siebel (rudolf.siebel@bvi.de)

General Secretary: Jacques Littré (Jacques.littre@swift.com)

Program Director: Charles Boniver (charles-raymond.boniver@swift.com)

Tel: + 32 2 655 4335

Fax: + 32 2 655 4552

Email: jacques.littre@swift.com

www.smpg.info

 

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