Clearstream has expanded its third-party fund processing platform in Luxembourg with the addition of the Banque Internationale à Luxembourg (BIL).
The scope of the services for BIL, Luxembourg’s oldest private bank, will include order execution, settlement and asset servicing for its mutual and hedge funds.
“Clearstream’s commitment to the investment fund industry was the key driver to become a user of Vestima. The long-standing experience in bringing efficiencies to the market will help us further industrialise order flow,” said Yves Baguet, chief operating officer, BIL.
BIL is latest financial institution to consolidate their fund processing activities onto an automated platform.
Last month, Swiss central securities depository SIX decided to move all of its fund processing responsibilities onto Clearstream’s Vestima platform. It has also signed up a number of banks including Northern Trust, Belgium’s bank Degroof Petercam, Swiss bank Edmond de Rothschild and Bank Vontobel, as well as the Korean Securities Depository (KSD).
“We welcome the decision of BIL to rely on Vestima. Providing operational efficiency to our partners is part of our DNA and we are looking forward to our future cooperation,” said Philippe Seyll, co-CEO and head of investment fund services, Clearstream.
The partnership reflects new research from the European Fund and Asset Management Association (EFAMA) and SWIFT, which found automation rates of cross-border funds reached 88% by the end of 2017, an increase of 1.3% over the year.
The study also found the total automation rate of order processed by Luxembourg-based and Irish-based transfer agents reached 85.4% and 92.1% respectively, up from 84.4% and 90.6% last year.
“In addition to the continuous growth of funds order volumes, it is exciting to see that the automation rates of supporting processes, such as price reporting, cash forecast reporting and funds transfers, are also on the rise,” said Janice Chapman, manager, investment funds, standards, SWIFT.