SWIFT is to open its know-your-customer (KYC) information sharing platform known as the KYC Registry to corporates.

The financial services messaging platform says enabling corporates to join the registry will be transformational, both for multi-banked corporates and for the 5,100 banks that already benefit from access to the registry and can see the advantage of adding corporates.

First steps

In a first step, by the end of 2019, all 2,000 SWIFT-connected corporate groups will be able to join the KYC Registry, and use it to upload, maintain and share their KYC information with their banks.

Major corporations use a range of banks in different jurisdictions around the world, with whom they need to exchange information to enable KYC checks. Data is held in different places and is often incomplete or out of date, making KYC processing time consuming for both corporates and their banks.
Harmonisation process

The absence of uniformity, differing jurisdictional requirements and the lack of standardised data across corporates means that current KYC databases increase these inefficiencies.

By joining SWIFT’s platform, corporates will be able to upload standard information to the KYC Registry and exchange other KYC documents requested by their banks.

Banks will benefit by having access to corporates’ information through the same central repository they use for their correspondent KYC checks.

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