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The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) announced today that it has launched enhancements to its Cost Basis Reporting Service (CBRS) to help customers comply with federal cost basis reporting regulations for mutual fund assets, which take effect in January 2012.
The CBRS platform provides a secure, automated and centralized communications hub for passing cost basis information from one participant to another on all asset transfers among broker/dealers, transfer agents, issuers, mutual funds and custodian banks in a secure electronic environment. The service, accessible through both automated computer to computer connections and via the Internet, allows financial intermediaries to pass their customers’ cost basis information on assets transferred through NSCC’s Automated Customer Account Transfer Service (ACATS), Fund/SERV®, Networking, and many other transactions.
“As the regulatory landscape continues to change, DTCC is focused on bringing new tools to our customers that will help them meet new requirements in the most cost effective manner while enabling them to further mitigate risk, support standardization and improve processing efficiencies” said Murray Pozmanter, DTCC managing director and general manager, Clearing Services. “Legislation surrounding cost basis reporting presents a new challenge to financial intermediaries and CBRS aims to help the industry comply with the regulation that continues to roll out in various market segments.”
Ann Bergin, DTCC managing director and general manager, Wealth Management Services, added “DTCC’s ability to leverage the CBRS technology across asset classes brings added value to the markets and allows our clients to better serve their millions of mutual funds investors.”
In 2010, DTCC leveraged its existing CBRS platform to build an enhanced technology solution in an effort to help customers comply with legislation that mandates the reporting of cost basis information on equity positions. In addition to servicing mutual fund assets, the new enhancements also include system improvements applicable to all asset classes.
“We anticipate a smooth transition next year in meeting our obligations for reporting cost basis data on mutual fund assets,” said Ellen Bocina, vice president, Product Development, Fidelity Investments. “DTCC’s CBRS platform has provided the industry with a secure and automated standard for transferring this information between financial intermediaries.”
“SunGard has been diligently preparing for and is ready to comply with the complex regulatory requirements surrounding mandatory cost basis reporting for mutual funds that go into effect in January, 2012,” said Jeff Naylor, vice president, Product Management at SunGard’s Asset Arena Transfer Agency business unit. “Asset Arena Transfer Agency is fully integrated with DTCC’s CBRS service which will help our customers meet this critical regulatory requirement in an efficient and cost-effective manner.”
CBRS’s enhancements are designed to help the industry meet specific regulations outlined in the U.S. Emergency Economic Stabilization Act, enacted in October, 2008, that mandates firms to pass cost basis information among financial intermediaries when assets move from one institution to another.
Next in the pipeline for CBRS are additional enhancements to help firms comply with future reporting mandates for fixed income and options, expected to take effect in 2013.
CBRS is offered by DTCC Solutions LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of DTCC.
