Bloomberg – New York -Bloomberg unveiled the Entity Exchange platform, a web-based, centralized and secure solution that enables buy-side firms to provide entity data and documentation to their trading counterparties. Entity Exchange eases the process of opening new trade accounts for the buy-side, while also helping brokers satisfy Know-Your-Customer (KYC) compliance requirements.

David Sharpe, Director of Operations at Fortress Investment Group said, “An investment firm of our size with a diverse portfolio needs to establish relationships with new trading partners quickly and securely so that we can effectively manage our operations.” Sharpe further explains, “The exchange of official information and documentation with our counterparties is also iterative and ongoing, which is why we adopted a solution that uniquely considers how to make this process easier for us.”

To make the most of sophisticated trading strategies, hedge funds need to trade with a wide variety of sell-side counterparties. These counterparties require a great deal of information and documentation to establish trading relationships, and these requirements frequently change and increase.

In fact, 70 percent of hedge funds maintained relationships with 30 or more counterparties according to an Aite Group study commissioned by Bloomberg. While global regulations require brokers to collect and organize more and more customer information as part of an established KYC process, entity information management is a two-way challenge that can also be made easier for the buy-side.  Entity Exchange takes a broader approach to KYC that optimizes the client onboarding process for the buy-side as well.

“Bloomberg reference data is widely used by financial institutions and is respected for its breadth and accuracy. The launch of Bloomberg’s Entity Exchange extends our expertise in reference data management and helps firms innovatively solve for the many on-boarding challenges they are faced with,” said Dan Matthies, head of Bloomberg Entity Exchange. “Entity Exchange also takes a new and unique approach to the KYC process that considers the buy-side’s on-boarding experience as well as the sell-side’s information requirements.”

Supported by Bloomberg’s data intelligence team, Entity Exchange aggregates an investment firm’s information into an entity profile used to automate the completion of various onboarding forms.  For example, when a broker sends a request for the client’s information, Entity Exchange automatically matches documents and data from the client’s profile to the information requested for the client to review before it is released to the broker.  The platform gives clients control over the distribution of sensitive firm information through a permission-based workflow supported by the same multi-factor authentication technology offered to Bloomberg Professional service subscribers.  Entity Exchange also produces a comprehensive audit trail of each workflow, in addition to delivering timely, client-validated information to sell-side firms.

To learn more about the Entity Exchange platform, please visit http://www.bloomberglp.com/entity-exchange/

BLOOMBERG, BLOOMBERG PROFESSIONAL and ENTITY EXCHANGE are trademarks and service marks of BFLP, a Delaware limited partnership, or its subsidiaries. © 2016 Bloomberg Finance L.P. All rights reserved.

About Entity Exchange
Entity Exchange is a centralized, web-based platform that gives hedge funds a secure and streamlined way to provide sensitive documents and data critical to the onboarding process to trading counterparties. Hedge funds can use this solution to manage multiple counterparty relationships through a single, secure platform. Funds can respond to requests for current documentation, give specific organizations permission to receive it and notify multiple counterparties about changes simultaneously.