T2S, CBF and Swift Releases in November 2024 – Information on the Deployment activities

08.11.2024

Following Announcement D24024, Clearstream Banking AG, Frankfurt

informs clients about the TARGET2-Securities (T2S) Release in November 2024 (T2S R2024.NOV) that will be deployed on

the weekend 16 and 17 November 2024
for business day Monday, 18 November 2024

This Announcement shows the intended timeline and modifications in the T2S Operational Day between Friday, 15, and Monday, 18 November 2024, for the implementations of T2S, CBF and Swift.

T2S Change Requests and T2S Problem Tickets

The lists of T2S Change Requests and T2S Problem Tickets (PBIs) attached to Announcement D24024 describe the scope of T2S R2024.NOV.

Please note that only Problem Tickets are listed that might have impact on CBF clients acting in ICP and / or DCP mode. Eleven PBIs, that can affect CBF clients, have been authorised for implementation with T2S R2024.NOV.

Impacts on the CBF Business Day for the Deployment Weekend

Due to the “T2S Release Weekend Schedule” the timeline of the operational day and respective reporting during the T2S deployment weekend will be changed.

In addition to the implementation activities of T2S and CBF, clients using the Swift network for instruction management must note that as of Saturday, 16 November 2024 from 16:00 (GMT) the changes induced by the Swift Release 2024 will be activated.

For the implementation weekend, Swift has announced the below-mentioned maintenance window2:

Swift Maintenance Schedule 

Weekend

Start time

End time

Maintenance type

Disruption

16 to 17 November 2024

Saturday 05:00 (GMT)

Saturday 16:00 (GMT)

General Maintenance

No disruption

Saturday 16:00 (GMT)

Sunday 05:00 (GMT)

Possible small disruption less than 10 minutes

Based on the currently available information, the following assumptions can be made:

  • Clients acting in ICP mode and using the CBF connectivity channels via Swift, MQ, File Transfer (FT) or ClearstreamXact need to consider that any instruction transmitted between Friday, 15 November 2024 at 20:00, and the finalisation of the Clearstream Banking implementation phase on Sunday, 17 November 2024 around 06:00, will be queued in the connectivity layer. All instructions received on Friday, 15 November 2024, by 19:45, that could not be processed, as well as queued instructions, will be processed after the deployment with the enhanced functionality. During the implementation weekend, only clients transmitting instructions via Swift to CBF will receive an acknowledgement upon receipt of the instruction based on their existing message subscription.
  • The opening hours of the Clearstream Online functionalities will be modified. The CASCADE HOST frontend and Xact Web Portal will be available until Friday, 15 November 2024, at 20:00. After this, clients are requested not to enter, modify or cancel instructions. Over the course of Sunday, 17 November 2024, the systems will probably be re-opened between 06:30 to 11:00.
  • Clients acting in ICP mode and using an automated connectivity channel (Swift, MQ or File Transfer (FT)) to receive the CBF settlement reporting are requested to check the modified reporting times, where applicable. The CBF business day 15 November 2024 is planned to be closed at 19:30. Afterwards, the End of Day (EoD) reporting will be prepared and sent. CBF will provide the files according to the existing message subscription. Depending on the T2S Release in November 2024 timeline, files might be empty and will be transmitted only if the related messages have been subscribed for. In addition, the client’s technical infrastructure should accept and store the provided files. Otherwise, the information / data will be lost. CBF recommends accepting files at any time during the T2S Release Weekend.
  • On Friday evening, 15 November 2024, T2S will presumably close the online functionality (T2S GUI, U2A) and the “Straight-Through Processing” channels (STP, A2A).
  • On Sunday morning, 17 November 2024, 11:00, T2S is expected to start its maintenance window. Incoming instructions that will reach T2S during the deployment phase or maintenance window are queued. After the reopening of T2S on Sunday, 17 November 2024, at around 21:00, once the A2A channel and the T2S GUI will be available, these instructions will be processed in line with the T2S Operational Day.
  • Clients acting in DCP mode and using the “YCON” procedure to receive real-time settlement reporting via CBF need to consider that these messages will be transmitted on Sunday, 17 November 2024, 06:00, after CBF has started to provide the settlement results in ICP mode.
  • For the processing via:
    • KADI (Corporate action processing for markets not migrated by the CAH project [CH, US]) and
    • Custody (Corporate action processing for OneClearstream markets and for securities migrated by the CAH project with CBF in its role as Issuer CSD)

      the following processing applies:

      Settlement instructions resulting from corporate actions processing will be created on Friday, 15 November 2024, in line with the regular business day and presented to T2S before the system will be closed for the deployment activities. On this processing day, clients will receive Corporate Actions messages (MT564, MT568) for KADI events only from 23:00, deviating from the regular transmission time (that is, 19:30). Additional reporting, which is delivered through CBF interfaces and generated by Custody and KADI, will be provided on Sunday, 17 November 2024, after 06:00 until the maintenance windows will start (at around 11:00).
  • In general, the processing at Clearstream Banking S.A., Luxembourg (CBL) is not impacted by the T2S Release Weekend procedure. The procedures in CBL regarding the settlement of DvP instructions in foreign currencies, stock exchange trades in non-collective safe custody (NCSC) as well as for the markets included in the Local Market Partner (LMP) concept will continue to run in the existing business as usual mode. However, the securities settlement of instructions which involve CBF accounts, and especially the settlement of instructions against a foreign currency, will be delayed. The cash management at CBL will be conducted according to the CBL timeline and the cash settlement result will be presented to CBF. CBF will queue these results. The settlement of the securities leg will be possible once CBF transmits the release instruction for the “CoSD Hold” to T2S. Therefore, the reporting of the cash settlement and securities settlement will be provided at different times.
  • CBF’s processing with the T2S Out-CSDs DTCC and SIX SIS will be delayed as well. Nevertheless, client settlement instructions will be forwarded to these CSDs in accordance with the market deadlines. Settlement results and feedback for pending instructions from these CSDs will be transmitted to T2S once CBF releases the queued instructions for the T2S Real-time Settlement (RTS) cycle scheduled for Sunday, 17 November 2024.

CBF client communication on the Deployment Weekend

During the T2S deployment weekend, “Operational News” will be published on the Clearstream website only if the implementation activities will be so late that CBF clients will be impacted by this delay in their settlement activities on Monday morning. Clients can set up the subscription to "Operational News" and their "Alerts" in the MyClearstream section under Subscriptions respectively under Real-time alerts. More specifically, CBF recommends the setup of a subscription to TARGET2-Securities alerts by Friday, 15 November 2024, at the latest.

On Friday, 15 November 2024, at 20:00, T2S will probably greenlight the implementation of the release software. After that, clients shall monitor ECB’s website where T2S regularly reports the latest deployment and operational status.

CBF indicative timeline for the Deployment Weekend in November 2024

The attached timeline indicates the changes in the CBF operational schedule during the T2S Release Deployment Weekend.

The timeline created by CBF is based on the latest version of the T2S Playbook for the deployment weekend provided end-October 2024. The plan covers the period from Friday, 15 November 2024, 17:45, to Monday, 18 November 2024, 06:00. Events and processes before and after this specific period can be considered as unchanged. The changes are shown in the “Revision” column as follows:

Contact

For further information, clients may contact Clearstream Banking Client Services or their Relationship Officer. Particular questions related to this Announcement will be routed to the experts of the T2S Settlement Functionality team.

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1. This Announcement is published by Clearstream Banking AG (CBF), registered office at Mergenthalerallee 61, 65760 Eschborn, Germany, registered with the Commercial Register of the District Court in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, under number HRB 7500.

2. All times in the Announcement are specified in Central European Time (CET), except in the Swift Maintenance Schedule where times are shown in Greenwich Mean Time (GMT).