Standards for Securities Transactions

Fund companies work together with various advisors, asset managers, brokers and custodians. This creates many interfaces in day-to-day business.

The following BVI recommendations simplify the business processes in portfolio management and trading with fund unit certificates through standardisation.

External business communication of capital management companies

Foreword (in German)
Trading and Settlement (in German)
Trading with Advisors/Outsourcing (in German)
Portfolio Management (in German)
Securities delivery (in German)
SMPG Trade Initiation & Confirmation Standards: Germany Market Practice
An example for MT 515
Networking via SWIFTNet (in German)

Communication between Investment Fund Management Company (KVG) and Advisor/Asset Manager ('BVI Excel Sheets')

BVI Excel Sheets: Version 7

In 2023, the following revisions of the BVI Excel Sheets have been made:

Foreign Exchange:  The revised EMIR reporting obligation will apply to all market participants (e.g. KVGs) from 29 April 2024. Under the new requirements, FX swaps with a UPI or ISIN should be reported to trade repositories, regardless of how the FX swap was confirmed or cleared. The updated Excel sheet contains the option to map an FX swap.

On March 14, 2024, the BVI committees decided to amend the updated BVI Excel sheet for foreign exchange again. The FX swap should be displayed in the "2-leg logic".

The excel sheet for Foreign Exchange is valid from 22 April 2024.

Version 7 contains the following elements:

Improved transparency  to better compare the new Excel sheets with previous version

• Two new columns have been added in the "Explanation" tab within the Excel sheets in order to envisage changes to the data fields compared to the previous version.
• BVI Excel sheets with no adjustments remain unchanged.

 General Changes for all Excel Sheets

• The naming convention for all Excel sheets should occur without the date. The date can be assigned via the version number (version 7 = publication 2019).
• All Excel sheets contain the current version number in cell A1 of the tab "Confirmation Sheet Blank" and the corresponding name in cell B1.
• All Excel sheets have been converted to the XLSX format.
   
• Changes in the Excel sheets compared to the previous versions are marked as follows:

    0 = no changes to previous version
    1 = Changes to previous version

The following Excel Sheets can be used:

• Futures & Options
• Securities
• Foreign Exchange
• Time Deposits & Overnight Money
• Call Money
• Interest Rate Swaps (IRS)
• IRS Swaption
• Credit Default Swaps (CDS)
• Total Return Swaps (TRS)
• Swaption (CDS)
• Inflation Swap

Download all Excel sheets in .zip format

The BVI Excel Sheets are used exclusively for communication via transaction recommendations or orders between Advisor/Asset Manager and KVG. BVI expects that trade confirmations and delivery instructions will only be made in ISO 15022 formats (MT 51x and MT 54x respectively) (see BVI Securities Transaction Standards "External Business Communication of Corporations / Trading and Settlement").

BVI expects that the "BVI Excel sheets" will only be used in this way for communication between the KVG and the Advisor/Asset Manager.

CCP-cleared transactions and display of compression: Creation of a compression sheet

In the context of compression for CCP-cleared transactions, it is discussed how the (outsourced) asset manager of the KVG could display a compression of two or more transactions. BVI provides the draft of an Excel sheet for the display of the compression of CDS cleared transactions from the (outsourced) asset manager to the KVG.

Compression Sheet

Standing Settlement Instructions, SSI

For the timely settlement of a securities transaction, the delivery and account information (standing settlement instructions, SSI) must also be coordinated with the business partners (e.g. broker and custodian). Central SSI databases provide an efficient means of maintaining and transmitting SSI data from KVGs, brokers/dealers and custodians. The Administration and Standardisation Committee has issued a recommendation on SSI auditing for member companies.

Recommendation SSI exam (in German)

Recommendation of the BVI Committee on Administration and Standardisation on the Collateralisation of Segments in Master Funds for Bilaterally Transacted OTC Derivatives

Since 1 March 2017, regulated investment funds (UCITS/AIF) have had to collateralise bilaterally concluded transactions in OTC derivatives with variation margin. The exchange of collateral comprises the so-called "variation margin", i.e. additional margin payments which serve to regularly offset fluctuations in the value of the OTC derivative contract.

The Committee recommends that member companies collateralise segments at master fund level.

Recommendation on the collateralisation of segments in master funds (in German)

Standards for Portfolio Transfers

Market Practice for Unit Certificate Trading in Germany

Foreword (in German)
Unit Certificate Business Investment Funds (in German)
Standardization of the share certificate business with the ISO 20022 message format (in German)

Market Practice for Unit Certificate Trading in Europe

EFAMA, Market Practice Working Document

Efficient investment fund business through standardisation

Recommendations of the BVI and the PRAXISFORUMS DEPOTBANKEN (in German)

The use of external sales partners is daily practice in many capital management companies. KVGs work with a large number of distribution partners from the credit and insurance industries, asset managers, independent agents and other distribution companies.

In each individual business relationship between the KVG and its sales partners, the contracts, service level agreements and data transmission paths must be defined bilaterally. This also applies, for example, to the procedures for reporting stocks, transactions and transfers from sales partners or depositories to the KVGs for the settlement of commission claims. A large number of different interfaces are maintained at great expense and by accepting considerable operational and financial risks. The necessary business processes are rarely automated.

Messages that are not timely and not coordinated across the entire sales chain prevent prompt billing and reduce its quality.

Standardized sample interface description

Since a standard based on ISO 20022 is not yet available for the procedures for reporting inventories, transactions and transfers from sales partners or depositories to the KVGs for the settlement of commission claims, BVI has developed a standardized sample interface description to reduce the effort required for processing different formats. The standard assumes that the custodian(s) of the sales partner report the holdings, transactions and transfers in funds to the KVGs separately for the own and externally mediated funds. The aim is to facilitate daily communication between a large number of sales partners, warehouses and KVGs on the data basis for the settlement of commissions.

You can download the standard below:

Notification for commission settlement (in German)

The SMPG establishes global guidelines (so-called "Market Practices") for the practical application of ISO securities trading standards in the areas of corporate actions, settlement & reconcilation and investment funds.