Goldman Sachs has achieved improvements in enhancing trade settlement efficiency through the use of Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation (DTCC)’s Central Trade Matching (CTM)’s Match to Instruct (M2i) workflow.
DTCC said that Goldman Sachs has streamlined its post-trade processes, resulting in a reduction in same-day affirmation (SDA) exceptions and settlement fails in Q4 2023 alone.
Risa Lederhandler, global head of equities and securities services operations at Goldman Sachs, said: “Automation is a key enabler of operational efficiency and enhanced client experience. We were pleased to validate through our analysis that our settlement efficiency strategy, supported by CTM’s M2i workflow, has resulted in a significant reduction in settlement fails for our clients.”
According to DTCC, clients using CTM’s M2i workflow will also benefit from central matching and auto-affirmation capabilities, which are typically more efficient than local matching and affirmation by custodians.
“We found that M2i’s process increased affirmation rates by 9pm ET on T, a key objective as we prepare for the move to T+1. In addition, the M2i platform’s enhanced SSI enrichment capabilities resulted in more settlements occurring without additional input from our Operations teams,” said Lederhandler. “As the industry continues to prepare for T+1, we are focused on further increasing our automation of allocations in the US market. M2i is core to this objective.”
DTCC said that majority of CTM investment managers using M2i to match and affirm their US trades achieve a near 100% affirmation rate by 9:00pm ET on trade date, meeting the requirements for US’s impending T+1 settlement deadline on 28 May 2024.
“It is exciting to see Goldman Sachs’ results from leveraging CTM’s M2i workflow, a critical enabler of T+1 that helps to significantly reduce trade fails and facilitates straight-through processing,” said Val Wotton, managing director and general manager of DTCC Institutional Trade Processing.
“Clients utilising M2i benefit from a significant increase in SDA rates for DTC-eligible trades, ultimately reducing costs related to trade fails, exception resolution costs, and operational friction. We are pleased to provide these benefits to the financial services industry.”
Goldman Sachs implemented CTM’s M2i workflow in Q4 2022 as part of their broader strategy to improve settlement efficiency and create a streamlined post trade experience for clients.
In September, DTCC revealed that alongside Goldman Sachs, 350 investment managers are utilising CTM’s automated trade affirmation features to expedite the post-trade process, aligning with the industry’s readiness for the US transition to T+1 trade settlement.