The Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) has gone live with real-time gross settlement (RTGS) and central securities depository (CSD) applications provided by SIA.
This new real-time financial market infrastructure will replace the two separate platforms Exchange Settlement Account System (ESAS) and the Central Securities Depository system (NZClear).
The RBNZ market infrastructures are used by 57 member organisations including banks, custodians, registries and brokers that total around 600 users from New Zealand, Australia and Asia.
According to RBNZ, the new market infrastructures are based on the RTGS and CSD applications provided by SIA and already used by several other central institutions across Europe, Africa, the Middle East and North America.
Mike Wolyncewicz, assistant governor and CFO of RBNZ, commented: “The extent of change is significant. Every day, transactions with a value of more than $30 billion are settled, so there has been a focus on getting this right, and not rushing out a replacement until we were confident that it was ready. This successful changeover is the result of months of rigorous testing and we appreciate the cooperation of the system’s key users.”
Nicola Cordone, CEO of SIA, added: “The successful go-live of this significant project with RBNZ represents another important step forward in our international presence. In particular, it is the first cornerstone in the delivery and implementation of SIA’s market infrastructure technologies in the Asia Pacific region.”
