Citi Publishes First Ever XBRL Dividend Message Over DTCC

NEW YORK, April 22, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Citi, The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) and XBRL US today announced that Citi has begun sending XBRL-formatted dividend announcements related to ADRs for which it is the depositary bank to DTCC through The Depository Trust Company (DTC), a DTCC subsidiary.  These announcements are used to update the DTCC database, consolidate corresponding information and distribute dividend information to DTCC users.  The use of XBRL for dividend announcements reduces the need for manual entry, thereby creating efficiency, reducing risk and enabling straight-through-processing.  This pilot program was developed to demonstrate the power of XBRL for corporate actions processing and is currently in place for American Depositary Receipts (ADRs).

Corporate actions, events that occur in the life of a public company, range from dividend announcements to complex mergers to stock splits, and typically require action on the part of an investor.  Corporate actions announcements are delivered to shareholders through SEC filings and news releases through numerous intermediaries.  Industry wide, many segments of today's process are manual and redundant, resulting in a lack of timeliness, the possibility of errors and substantial costs.

"This is a significant milestone in demonstrating how corporate actions processing can benefit from a technology innovation like structured data," said Alan Smith, Managing Director, Citi Securities and Fund Services (SFS), "We're pleased that Citi has taken a key role in an initiative that ultimately will result in better, faster and much less expensive data for the marketplace." 

Since October, Citi has also been distributing the XBRL-formatted dividend announcements via secure FTP to GlobeTax, also a member of the ADR pilot and Citi's appointed agent for tax relief and reclaim services for the ADRs it issues.  The next step in the pilot program is to expand the program into other types of corporate actions announcements and into announcements by US-based public company issuers. 

"DTCC receives thousands of announcements from issuers and intermediaries every day," said Dan Thieke, DTCC Managing Director, Asset Services, "XBRL enables us to take that information directly into our systems without manual intervention, thereby reducing risk and cost and  boosting efficiency and accuracy."

To review the XBRL Corporate Actions Taxonomy, go to http://xbrl.us/taxonomies/Pages/2012corpactions.aspx

About Citi
Citi, the leading global bank, has approximately 200 million customer accounts and does business in more than 160 countries and jurisdictions. Citi provides consumers, corporations, governments and institutions with a broad range of financial products and services, including consumer banking and credit, corporate and investment banking, securities brokerage, transaction services, and wealth management.

Through its Securities and Fund Services business, Citi's industry-focused experts provide issuers, investors and intermediaries worldwide with tailored investment services solutions delivered through proven global platforms that feature modular, open architecture. With $13.5 trillion of assets under custody and the industry's largest proprietary network, clients can leverage Citi's local market expertise and global reach to extract value across the entire investment value chain.

Additional information may be found at www.citigroup.com | Twitter: @Citi | YouTube: www.youtube.com/citi | Blog: http://new.citi.com | Facebook: www.facebook.com/citi | LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/citi 

About DTCC
DTCC has operating facilities and data centers around the world and, through its subsidiaries, automates, centralizes, and standardizes the post-trade processing of financial transactions for thousands of institutions worldwide. With 40 years of experience, DTCC is the premier post-trade market infrastructure for the global financial services industry, simplifying the complexities of clearance, settlement, asset servicing, global data management and information services for equities, corporate and municipal bonds, government and mortgage-backed securities, derivatives, money market instruments, syndicated loans, mutual funds, alternative investment products, and insurance transactions. In 2012, DTCC's subsidiaries processed securities transactions valued at approximately US$1.6 quadrillion. Its depository provides custody and asset servicing for securities issues from 131 countries and territories valued at US$37.2 trillion. DTCC's global trade repositories record more than US$500 trillion in gross notional value of transactions made worldwide.  For more information, visit dtcc.com, and follow us on Twitter: @The_DTCC

About XBRL US
XBRL US is the non-profit consortium for XBRL business reporting standards in the U.S. and it represents the business information supply chain. Its mission is to support the implementation of XBRL business reporting standards through the development of taxonomies for use by U.S. public and private sectors, with a goal of interoperability between sectors, and by promoting XBRL adoption through marketplace collaboration. XBRL US has developed taxonomies for U.S. GAAP, credit rating and mutual fund reporting under contract with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, and has developed a taxonomy for corporate actions. Learn more at http://xbrl.us

SOURCE XBRL US