Eurosystem Collateral Management System (ECMS) and Single Collateral Management Rulebook for Europe (SCoRE) Implementation
Clearstream’s ECMS Programme will implement collateral management harmonisation standards set by the Advisory Group for Market Infrastructure for Securities Collateral (AMI-SeCo) Single Collateral Management Rulebook for Europe (SCoRE) and facilitate triparty collateral management with central banks via the European Central Bank's (ECB) ECMS platform.
The ECB’s Governing Council has decided to reschedule the launch of ECMS to 16 June 2025, following an assessment conducted by the ECB Market Infrastructure Board (MIB).
Corporate Actions: Clearstream will communicate with ECMS in ISO 20022 format. Regarding communication between Clearstream and its clients, enhancements to existing messages in ISO 15022 format resulting from the implementation of SCoRE will be implemented as originally planned on 8 April 20241, and 18 November 2024, while communication between Clearstream and its clients in ISO 20022 format (see SCoRE CA Standard 15) will be made available in line with the ECMS go-live date on 16 June 2025. Clearstream will continue to support communication with clients in ISO 15022 format in coexistence with ISO 20022 format after the ECMS go-live date until further notice.
Triparty Collateral Management: Clearstream will communicate with ECMS in ISO 20022 format. Following consultation, communication between Clearstream and its clients will remain in ISO 15022 format after the ECMS go-live date.
This area of the website contains information covering such topics as:
- Overview on ECMS and SCoRE
- Impact of SCoRE and ECMS on Clearstream Services
- Key information and contact details for Clearstream clients
Overview on ECMS and SCoRE
The ECMS will be implemented by the 19 National Central Banks (NCB) of the countries, which have adopted the euro, to replace their current local collateral management systems.
In parallel, the Collateral Management Harmonisation Task Force (CMH-TF) of the Advisory Group for Market Infrastructure for Securities Collateral (AMI-SeCo) has identified ten areas for harmonisation within collateral management.
To monitor this harmonisation process, four dedicated Expert Groups (EG) were created which are:
- Bilateral Collateral Management EG: The group has analysed activities on bilateral collateral management, margin calls, cut-off times and sourcing of collateral.
- Triparty Collateral Management EG: The group has analysed any questions related to the development of the single triparty model with a focus on messaging.
- Asset Servicing EG: The group has analysed issues related to corporate actions (focus on equities). If needed, questions on billing processes will also be analysed.
- Taxation Processes EG: The group was responsible for reviewing taxation processes (relevant to collateral management and asset servicing).
The output of these Expert Groups is consolidated into the AMI-SeCo SCoRE, made up of various standard documents which are published on the ECB website.
The standards have already been agreed for the three of the Collateral Management Harmonisation areas:
- Triparty Collateral Management (TPA);
- Corporate Actions (CA); and
- Billing Processes.
Clearstream is a Member of the CMH-TF, that formulates and monitors the implementation of the SCoRE standards and is also a key contributor within each of the Expert Groups.
Impact of SCoRE and ECMS on Clearstream services
The new SCoRE standards set by AMI-SeCo and the implementation of ECMS mean that some changes are required to comply and operate within the new environment.
The SCoRE standards will implement specific changes in areas such as triparty collateral management, corporate actions and billing as well as the introduction of the new ISO 20022 messaging standard based on new data structures. For corporate actions processing and triparty collateral management, Clearstream Banking will continue to support ISO 15022 message standards for its clients, while developing ISO 20022 concurrently, in order to comply with SCoRE.
Clearstream Banking expects to comply with the SCoRE standards wherever possible and facilitate the migration to ECMS by the targeted launch date, while making every effort to minimise the impact on clients during these changes.
All clients, including issuers and issuer agents, will be required to review potential impact to a greater or lesser extent, however Clearstream Banking is already compliant with many of the new current standards, limiting such impact to clients. Those clients, who are also Eurosystem counterparties, will be most impacted by collateral management changes. However, all clients may be impacted by changes to corporate actions processes.
If clients do not use a TPA for collateral management, and intend to communicate directly with the ECMS, message exchange with ECMS will need to be based on ISO 20022 message standards. Further information can be obtained from the clients’ national central bank.
Detailed information on the upcoming changes is included within the Functional Specifications document “Implementation of SCoRE Standards and readiness for ECMS - Functional specifications”.
Client information sessions
The following client information sessions took place:
Area | Topic | Time | Supporting documentation | |
Corporate Actions | ECMS/SCoRE impacts | 24 May 2023 | ||
Triparty Collateral Management | ECMS/SCoRE impacts and Xemac decommissioning impacts | 25 May 2023 | Information Session SCoRE and ECMS: Triparty Collateral Management | |
A recording can be made available on request.
The next client information sessions will be announced in due course.
Client testing
Clearstream will offer client tests during three dedicated testing windows, according to the following preliminary timeline.
As a result of the postponement of the ECMS launch date to 16 June 2025, Clearstream will provide clients with an additional testing window during which they will have the opportunity to retest the Triparty Collateral Management functionality with ECMS, as outlined in the preliminary schedule below.
Further details will be provided in due course.
Scope | Test window | Test registration deadline | |
Phase 1 | Corporate Actions (ISO 15022 format) | 5 March 2024 - 28 March 2024 | 31 January 2024 |
Phase 2 | Triparty Collateral Management (ISO 15022 format) | 1 July 2024 - 6 September 2024 Connectivity testing only: Guided testing Cycle 1: Test environment downtime: Connectivity testing only: Guided testing Cycle 2: During the remaining weeks clients can participate in free testing. More information will be available in the related client test guide. | 31 May 2024 |
Phase 3 | Corporate Actions (ISO 20022 format) | 15 October 2024 – 31 October 2024 (pilot client testing only)a | 7 October 2024 |
Retesting | Triparty Collateral Management (ISO 15022 format) | 17 February – 21 February 2025: Connectivity testing only 24 February – 7 March 2025: 10 March – 21 March 2025: | Available for all clients already registered for Phase 2 |
a. Communication between Clearstream Banking and its clients in ISO 20022 format will be made available in line with the revised ECMS go-live date on 16 June 2025.
Clients will be able to communicate with Clearstream via the following connectivity channels:
- Xact via Swift;
- Xact via File Transfer;
- Xact Web Portal.
Further to the connectivity between clients and Clearstream Banking, clients will have the opportunity to test the end-to-end Triparty Collateral Management flow with ECMS and to view in ECMS the end result of the actions they have taken in Clearstream.
Test registration forms for each phase will be made available in due course in the publications table below.
Publications
CBF accounts | CBL or CBF-i accounts | |
Announcements | ||
ECMS Guide for Triparty Collateral Management and Bilateral Collateral Management – Clearstream Offering | ECMS Guide for Triparty Collateral Management and Bilateral Collateral Management | |
Functional specifications | Implementation of SCoRE Standards and readiness for ECMS - Functional specifications | |
Issuer and issuer agent impacts | Implementation of SCoRE Standards and readiness for ECMS - Impact on issuers and issuer agents | |
Client testing documentation: Phase 1 - Corporate Actions (ISO 15022 format) | SCoRE client testing registration form for Corporate Actions ISO 15022 | |
Client testing documentation: Phase 2 - Triparty Collateral Management (ISO 15022 format) | ||
Availability of Clearstream client testing environment | ||
Issue Declaration Form | ||
Further client readiness documents will be added in due course.
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1. For technical reasons, in order to facilitate testing according to the ECMS project timetable, it was necessary to introduce the following change as part of the November release 2023 (effective 20 November 2023):
The subscription to the IPAR MT564 REPE has been increased to also cover event types DVOP, ODLT, EXTM, TREC and REMK. If the client's current subscription covers all event types by default, it has automatically been extended to include the event types DVOP, ODLT, EXTM, TREC and REMK after the November release go-live on 20 November 2023. If the client does not wish to have these events included in their reporting, they must ensure that they deselect these events from their subscription.