Fatca special report

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Gather Ye Data While Ye May

Inside Reference Data has devoted a lot of coverage to the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (Fatca) in recent months, and there have been many developments to report with this law, the agreements being made internationally to enforce it and the measures being taken at firms to comply with it. That can be seen in the news section of this special report, with reports of the US authorities postponing deadlines for Fatca compliance, European efforts to find ways to get the entire industry working together on compliance solutions, and even the chance that many other countries will create their own versions of Fatca to collect foreign transaction taxes.

BNY Mellon's Amy Harkins pointed out the possibility of a "global Fatca" back in June. In the Virtual Roundtable, we asked how Fatca as it stands is likely to affect data gathering and management. Harkins prescribes complete updates to firms' systems to accommodate new processes before addressing client onboarding under the new rules. Many others in the industry have noted that the US Internal Revenue Service's guidance on Fatca is still incomplete, even though postponements to key compliance milestones have already been made. The missing details, Harkins says, are "particularly challenging" for compliance efforts.

The industry knows it must collect more information than previously required under traditional "know-your-customer" processes, as Avox's Mark Davies notes. This includes alterations to a client's status, such as a change to its US or foreign status. It also means obtaining Global Intermediary Identification Numbers (GIINs), as SIX Financial Information's Jacob Gertel points out. With the implementation of Fatca set tobeginJuly1, there will be more data to track and manage. Industry executives are thinking about how to do this and trying to act while there is still time.

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