London, New York and Singapore – Kyc.com, the joint venture between Markit Ltd. (Nasdaq: MRKT) and Genpact Limited (NYSE: G) today announced the expansion of its service to Hong Kong and Singapore. This rollout is in addition to jurisdictional coverage in the U.S., UK and Australia, which launched in 2014.
Standard Chartered, the UK-headquartered bank with a large footprint in Asia, is supportive of kyc.com and is in the process of joining the service. In addition, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, Morgan Stanley and UBS are already signed up and will be using the service to support their due diligence in the region. Over 1,500 buy-side firms and corporations, representing 37,000 legal entities, are also using kyc.com to simplify the provision of know your customer (KYC) and other documentation to their banks.
Kyc.com is a centralized service enabling investment managers, corporations and banks to streamline the KYC process by collecting the required documentation and data once, to create a reusable profile. With over 169,000 entities and 350,000 documents across kyc.com and Markit’s Counterparty Manager, customers benefit from validated information to determine beneficial ownership.
Commenting on the exciting developments around the uptake of the service, David Deane, Managing Director of Client and Data Services at Deutsche Bank said, “We actively support the use of KYC utilities and have been investing in the development of the kyc.com service as a founding design partner since its inception. Now that the service has been developed, we want to encourage market adoption. Deutsche Bank is inviting customers to subscribe to this service and contribute their KYC documentation and data to kyc.com.”
“HSBC is committed to a consistent, comprehensive approach to financial crime risk assessment and regulatory compliance, and that requires a robust KYC process,” said Greg Watson, Global Head of Banking Middle Office at HSBC. “Using kyc.com improves the client experience while standardizing and simplifying data gathering and validation.”
A recent survey commissioned by kyc.com revealed that 63 percent of financial institutions across Asia believe varying KYC standards across the region is the biggest factor impacting their level of regulatory risk. When conducting due diligence checks on customers, 58 percent surveyed have either terminated existing customers or refused new customers given due diligence concerns.
“One of the biggest challenges to conducting KYC in Asia is the regional variation for cross-border compliance, which adds a layer of complexity to managing our customer relationships,” said David Fleet, Managing Director of Client On-boarding and Management, Standard Chartered. “For us, it’s about establishing best practice and mutualizing efforts to remove some of the regional anomalies. Kyc.com supports this and provides a more cost-effective way to conduct our business.”
“As design partner of kyc.com, we welcome and support Markit and Genpact on this development. At UBS, we actively encourage the adoption of KYC utilities to drive industry simplification and improve the delivery of services to our clients,”said Daniel Haid, Managing Director of Client On-boarding, UBS. “Current practices are complex and time consuming. Gathering client information in a single place benefits both clients and financial institutions.”
“We are seeing a coming-together of standards for connected due diligence processes, whether it’s client on-boarding or meeting tax requirements,” said Jon May, Chief Executive Officer of kyc.com. “This rollout, coupled with our support for Australia in this region, increases efficiency, utilizes repeatable KYC processes and enables our customers to focus on other higher-value areas, such as innovation, to strengthen their competitiveness and compliance in the financial sector.”
About kyc.om
Markit and Genpact have proven track records in helping customers in the field of KYC data management. Together the firms offer a robust set of compliance, tax, data validation and reference data services that are relied upon by over 1,500 buy-side firms, 7,000 corporations and 80 banks. For more information, please see www.kyc.com.
About Markit
Markit is a leading global provider of financial information services. We provide products that enhance transparency, reduce risk and improve operational efficiency. Our customers include banks, hedge funds, asset managers, central banks, regulators, auditors, fund administrators and insurance companies. Founded in 2003, we employ over 4,000 people in 11 countries. Markit shares are listed on Nasdaq under the symbol MRKT. For more information, please see www.markit.com.
About Genpact
Genpact (NYSE: G) stands for “generating business impact.” We architect the Lean DigitalSM enterprise through a unique approach based on our patented Smart Enterprise Processes (SEPSM) framework that re-imagines our clients’ middle and back offices to generate growth, cost efficiency and business agility. Our hundreds of long-term clients include more than one-fourth of the Fortune Global 500. We have grown to over 70,000 people in 25 countries, with key management and a corporate office in New York City. We believe we are able to generate impact quickly and power Intelligent OperationsSM for our clients because of our business domain expertise and experience running complex operations, driving our unbiased focus on what works and making technology-enabled transformation sustainable. Behind our passion for technology, process and operational excellence is the heritage of a former General Electric division that has served GE businesses since 1998. For additional information, visit www.genpact.com. Follow Genpact on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube.
