EFAMA and SWIFT year-end survey confirms a strong increase in cross-border fund order volumes in 2013, with automation rates reaching 79% of fund orders

Brussels, 30 April 2014 - The European Fund and Asset Management Association (EFAMA), in collaboration with SWIFT, has today published a new report on the evolution of the automation and standardisation rates of fund orders received by transfer agents (TAs) in the cross-border fund centres of Luxembourg and Ireland in 2013. This report, entitled Fund Processing Standardisation, underscores the industrys commitment to move away from manual processes towards more efficient automation and standardisation practices.

The report is part of an ongoing campaign by EFAMA and SWIFT to highlight the progress and importance of automation and standardisation rates of cross-border funds orders. 31 TAs in Ireland and Luxembourg participated in the survey, cumulatively representing more than 80 percent of the total incoming third-party investment fund order volumes in both markets.

Total order volumes increased by 21% in 2013, bringing the total volume processed by the 31 survey participants to 29.5 million orders last year.

Total automation rates reached 78.7% at the end of 2013, compared to 77.7% a year earlier. This trend was driven by an increase in the use of ISO messaging standards (+1.5 percentage points in 2013 to 45.3%), and a fall in the use of manual order processing and proprietary File Transfer Protocol (FTP) formats, which totalled 21.3% and 33.4% in Q4 2013, respectively.

The total automation rate in Luxembourg increased to 75.3% in Q4 2013 (+1.6 percentage points compared to Q4 2012), mainly reflecting a rise in the use of ISO standards, which gained +1.2 percentage points to stand at 57.7%.

The total automation rate in Ireland rose to 85.6% in Q4 2013 (+0.3 percentage point compared to Q4 2012), thanks to a rise in the use of ISO standards (+1.6 percentage point to 20.9%).

Peter De Proft, Director General of EFAMA noted:
Five years ago, at the time of the release of the first EFAMA-SWIFT report, we set an 80% target for the automation rate of orders of cross-border funds. The Transfer Agent communities of Luxembourg and Ireland have never been so close to reaching this goal. The achievement, and the regular monitoring of the progress made in this area, highlights the fund industrys commitment to become more efficient to the benefit of its clients.

Fabian Vandenreydt, Head of Markets Management, Innotribe and SWIFT Institute, added:
We applaud the continuous progress towards ISO adoption along with the substantial increase in funds order volumes. Together with EFAMA, we are making great strides to alleviate the high costs and inefficiencies associated with manual processing by supporting programmes that foster automation and standardisation for the funds industry. And it is clearly moving forward in the right direction, which is very encouraging.

Ends

* Please see the accompanying attachment for the joint EFAMA/SWIFT standardisation report for 2013 and the Notes to editors section for further information about EFAMA and SWIFT.

For further information, please contact:

Peter De Proft Bernard Delbecque
Director General Director of Economics and Research
EFAMA EFAMA
Peter.Deproft@efama.org Bernard.Delbecque@efama.org
+32-2-513 39 69 +32-2-513 39 69
cc: info@efama.org cc: info@efama.org

Valrie Letellier
Senior Market Manager
Marketing
SWIFT
Valerie.LETELLIER@swift.com
+32-2-655 3944
cc: JoAnn.Healy@swift.com

Notes to editors:

About the European Fund and Asset Management Association (EFAMA)

EFAMA is the representative association for the European investment management industry. EFAMA represents through its 27 member associations and 62 corporate members about EUR 17 trillion in assets under management of which EUR 9.8 trillion managed by over 55,000 investment funds at end December 2013. Just over 35,600 of these funds were UCITS (Undertakings for Collective Investments in Transferable Securities) funds. For more information about EFAMA, please visit www.efama.org.

SWIFT is a member-owned cooperative that provides the communications platform, products and services to connect over 10,000 banking organisations, securities institutions and corporate customers in 212 countries. SWIFT enables its users to exchange automated, standardised financial information securely and reliably, thereby lowering costs, reducing operational risk and eliminating operational inefficiencies. SWIFT also brings the financial community together to work collaboratively to shape market practice, define standards and debate issues of mutual interest. For more information about SWIFT, please visit www.swift.com.

The report can be downloaded on the websites of EFAMA and SWIFT.