Across asset classes, the structure of markets is changing with new information flows between traders, venues clearers, depositories and regulators. The redefinition of the financial messaging landscape is continuous and is not stopping any time soon. Currently high, and for the first time on the agenda for U.S. investment firms is MiFIR. Dates may change, but the reporting requirements remain.

MiFIR, the challenges:

• 65 new reporting fields, which is a substantial increase from the current 26 fields required.
• new standards: many firms do not have data solutions that are aligned with the ISO 20022 standard.
• Approved Reporting Mechanism (ARMs) will continue to accept transaction reports in existing formats such as CSV.
• Global expanding compliance obligations result in multiple reporting solutions specific to each geography.
• The persistence of legacy systems in the back office increasing the risk of non compliance.

10 steps to success:

Favor data integration tools that are easy to use, and involves minimal programming and achieves implementation mainly through configuration. Make sure you can:

1. use the tool without too much training and specialized expertise for your business analyst or data analyst;
2. quickly and flexibly handle multiple and ever-increasing numbers of financial message standards, particularly ISO 20022 format variants rules and regulations;
3. have the option to test the integration solution thoroughly before deployment;
4. deploy the solution in any infrastructure;
5. reuse or easily customize the solution to manage multiple regulatory reporting requirements
6. achieve complete compliance of all asset classes;
7. define a multiple office concept or concepts, e.g. for regional offices, branch offices or independent subsidiaries;
8. execute searches, reporting, management information and online access for reconciliation purposes;
9. have full access to all audit trails of the history of each and every transaction reported for regulatory audit purposes;
10. examine real time status on drilldown dashboards at any time.

The need for speed and flexibility in responding to change is becoming the standard market practice to remain compliant with regulatory change. What’s your experience? What would you add to this list?