As the digital transformation of primary bond markets continues to accelerate, ICMA and its primary market constituents have built consensus to represent key bond information. The Bond Data Taxonomy (BDT), formerly known as the Common Data Dictionary, provides an agreed language to promote automation and reduce the risk of fragmentation across the issuance process.

ICMA is pleased to announce the launch of the ICMA Bond Taxonomy Pack which standardises key economic terms of a vanilla bond (eg nominal amounts, denominations, currencies, prices, net proceeds, interest, and interest payment related information), key dates (eg pricing, settlement, issue dates) among other information (eg whether bearer or registered, status of the note, relevant parties, ratings) typically included within a term sheet as the initial use case and scope of work. The BDT Pack includes machine-readable definitions of key fields, expected values, and relevant ISO elements, as well as examples and a user guide.

ICMA launches the ICMA Bond Taxonomy Pack which standardises key economic terms of a vanilla bond. The Pack includes machine-readable definitions of key fields, expected values, and relevant ISO elements, as well as examples and a user guide.

To download https://t.co/lnSXrdsQcA pic.twitter.com/TRMjI4LQrR

— ICMA (@ICMAgroup) March 15, 2023

The BDT as a ‘common language’ is expected to:

• Promote straight-through-processing (STP) and interoperability, assisting firms involved during the issuance process and streamlining post-trade operations.
• Be vendor agnostic, facilitating the exchange of data between multiple solutions and systems.
• Lay a common foundation for leveraging new technologies, such as distributed ledger, and developing new services.

Download the ICMA Bond Data Taxonomy pack

The BDT is available to both members and non-members to foster interoperability and adoption.

ICMA will review the Bond Data Taxonomy periodically through its BDT Working Group and expand its scope in line with market developments and member demand. All market constituents are welcome to engage in its development going forward. The group is open to all ICMA members and represents a broad constituency from banks, investors, issuers, market infrastructures, law firms and vendor firms. The group may also invite guests and observers to attend meetings.

Please contact us if you would like to join.

Source: ICMA