SWIFT Goes Live With KYC Registry for Correspondent Banks

SWIFT has gone live with its KYC Registry for correspondent banks, with over 20 global and regional banks joining the utility to help the banks share efforts in Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance activities.

“Regulatory compliance imposes an enormous cost burden on banks and they are actively looking for common platforms to help mutualize that cost and reduce risk,” says Gottfried Leibbrandt, CEO, SWIFT. “The KYC Registry is our next flagship in financial crime compliance, delivering on our commitment to provide community-wide solutions for the industry.”

The KYC Registry works by having banks contribute a baseline set of data and documentation for validation by SWIFT, which the contributors can then share with their counterparties, though each bank keeps ownership of its own information and decides who else can view it. There is no charge to share data, and for now, in order to get the most benefits out of the registry, SWIFT has made data consumption free in 2015 for those that contribute their own information to the registry and promote it to their correspondents.

“Correspondent banking relationships are critical to trade and economic development in emerging markets,” says Steven Beck, head of trade finance, Asian Development Bank. “We welcome The KYC Registry as a way for banks in these markets to demonstrate transparency and manage their counterparties’ information requests accurately and efficiently.”