Developed in consultation with clients and partners, the new module comprehensively addresses the primary challenges that investment management organizations face in monitoring sensitive industries compliance - the breadth of rules coverage and industry classification.

Sensitive industries regulation covers investment ownership in areas like media, defense, aviation, and energy deemed critical to a jurisdiction’s sovereignty. Unrelenting changes across the asset management landscape from industry consolidation to COVID-19 market disruptions have contributed to the growing prevalence of sensitive industries monitoring rules. These include continuous changes in ownership thresholds and requirements to obtain regulatory pre-approvals before certain investments may take place.

Financial firms must be able to deal with the complexities that arise from multiple, overlapping rules coming from regulatory bodies outside of traditional investment supervision. They must accurately monitor their equity holdings in designated sensitive industries, ensure prohibited equities are not traded and respond quickly to rule changes. With no single source of comprehensive rules and reliable industry classification information, organizations face a herculean task that is challenging to complete with manual, resource-intensive processes.

AxiomSL’s Sensitive Industries module incorporates not only industry, but also sub-industry codes into its EquityView data dictionary architecture, enabling a high degree of accuracy around industry classification tagging - and with its robust transparent rules engine enables monitoring across multiple complex rules. Clients can easily configure foreign and local jurisdictions according to the entity group’s location thereby triggering relevant rules. Furthermore, dashboards allow clients visibility into multiple types of notifications, including pre-approval checks and proximity alerts.

Gaurav Chandra, Global Product Manager, Global Shareholding Disclosures, AxiomSL, stated: “Providing a wide range of rules coverage and enhancing the data dictionary with GICS and other industry classifications necessary to correctly monitor sensitive industries, will enable financial firms to invest with confidence.” In addition,” he continued, “our innovative approach to solving the industry classification challenge, including the parent-subsidiary relationship, will enable more clarification to develop around industry classifications to the benefit of all investors. Another key area of concern expressed by the client community is the need for flexibility,” Chandra added.