On this peak day, more than 35.4% of the messages were sent over SWIFTNet, illustrating the continuous progress of this community-wide migration towards the Q4 2004 completion.

André Boico, Director, Pricing, Information Services and Analysis, SWIFT, reflects "Though peaks traditionally happen at the end of quarters because of reporting requirements which generate significant traffic, this is the first time since 1999 that a peak is reached at the end of the first quarter." Boico expands, "This peak could be attributed to contribution by the latest Market Infrastructure which decided to use SWIFT, BIREL (Banca d'Italia’s real time gross settlement system), as well as by the general growth in traffic linked to the increased economic activity."

Messages sent via SWIFT per day have tripled in volume over the past seven years, up from three million in 1996 to nine million messages per day in 2004. On a year to date basis, FIN message traffic reached a record 2 billion messages on 22 December 2003.

"Nine million messages per day is an attestation that the SWIFT community continues to grow and prosper. As the financial industry evolves, so do its messaging needs, and I am confident that we will reach the 10 million messages threshold in 2004," said Boico.

FIN is SWIFT's core store-and-forward messaging services serving over 7,500 financial institutions in 200 countries to exchange financial data securely, cost effectively and reliably.