Capital Markets Post-Trade Design Template (T+1, FIX, ISO 20022)

Capital Markets Post-Trade Design: [Firm or platform name]

Solution design for the post-trade chain of a broker, bank or asset manager: trade capture, allocation, confirmation and affirmation, clearing, settlement, reference data, fails management and reconciliation. It is written for the move to a one-business-day settlement cycle (T+1): in the United States under SEC Rule 15c6-1 as amended in 2023 (compliance date 28 May 2024), and in the European Union under Regulation (EU) 2025/2075 amending the Central Securities Depositories Regulation (applies from 11 October 2027). Message references use the FIX Protocol (FIX 5.0 SP2 and FIX Latest) and ISO 20022 securities settlement messages. Replace every [bracketed] value and every row marked Example. Regulatory dates and obligations are summarised for planning only: check the current official texts, CSD and CCP rulebooks with a qualified professional. This is a documentation format, not legal or financial advice.

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Revision history

Contents

1. Scope and drivers
2. Market and infrastructure register
3. Trade lifecycle and flows
4. Trade capture and enrichment
5. Allocation, confirmation and affirmation
6. Clearing
7. Settlement instructions and messages
8. T+1 timeline and cut-offs
9. Fails, penalties and buy-ins
10. Reference data
11. Funding, FX and securities financing
12. Reconciliation and operational controls
13. Non-functional design, testing and cutover
14. Deadline register
15. Traceability matrix
16. Glossary and references

1. Scope and drivers

1.1 Scope

1.2 Drivers

1.3 Principles

1. Match early: every trade should be matched with the counterparty or affirmed by the client on trade date, not on settlement date.
2. Process events, not batches: each lifecycle step starts when the previous one completes, with batch jobs only as a safety net.
3. One golden source per reference data item, with standing settlement instructions (SSIs) held electronically and never re-keyed.
4. Every trade carries the same identifiers from execution to settlement and reconciliation.

2. Market and infrastructure register

Status notes to check at the source before use:

• The amended SEC Rule 15c6-1 (Release 34-96930, adopted 15 February 2023) set T+1 as the standard settlement cycle for most US broker-dealer transactions from 28 May 2024. The same release added Rule 15c6-2 on completing allocations, confirmations and affirmations as soon as technologically practicable and no later than the end of trade date. Check the release for the exact scope and exceptions.
• Regulation (EU) 2025/2075 of 8 October 2025 amends Article 5 of Regulation (EU) No 909/2014 (CSDR) to require T+1 for transactions in transferable securities executed on trading venues. It was published in the Official Journal on 14 October 2025, entered into force on 3 November 2025 and applies from 11 October 2027. Check the consolidated text for the exemptions, such as privately negotiated trades executed on a venue and certain securities financing transactions.
• The UK has announced the same date, 11 October 2027. HM Treasury published a draft statutory instrument amending Article 5 of the UK CSDR in November 2025 (as reported by HM Treasury's T+1 policy update and law-firm summaries); check legislation.gov.uk for the final instrument and the FCA publications for the binding text.

3. Trade lifecycle and flows

3.1 Agency equity trade with block allocation

Example: an asset manager sends one block order; the broker executes it, the manager allocates it to funds, and the broker settles each allocation through the CSD.

3.2 Lifecycle states

Each allocation moves through these states; the settlement engine publishes a state-change event for each transition so that operations screens and reconciliations read the same status.

3.3 Flow inventory

4. Trade capture and enrichment

Enrichment rules:

• Add settlement place, settlement date, SSIs, fees, commissions and taxes from reference data at capture, not at instruction time.
• Calculate the intended settlement date from the trade date, the settlement cycle of the market and the business-day calendars of both the market and the settlement currency.
• Keep the execution identifiers from the venue and the order system on every record so that breaks can be traced back to the fill.
• Flag trades that already miss the same-day affirmation cut-off at capture, so operations sees them while there is still time to act.

5. Allocation, confirmation and affirmation

5.1 Allocation channels

5.2 Rules

1. Allocations are matched against the block quantity and average price; a residual of more than the price rounding tolerance is a break.
2. Commission, fees and taxes are calculated per allocation and sent in the confirmation, so the client can match its own calculation.
3. A trade that is not affirmed by the affirmation cut-off is escalated automatically to the client service desk and appears on the fails prediction screen in section 9.
4. Standing settlement instructions are taken from the electronic SSI source at allocation time; an SSI change after confirmation requires a re-confirmation.

5.3 Measures

6. Clearing

Design notes:

• Margin calls from the CCP arrive intraday; link them to the treasury funding plan in section 11.
• Keep both the gross trades and the net obligations, so that a failed net delivery can be traced to the underlying client trades.
• Clearing membership models (direct, general clearing member, client clearing) decide who instructs settlement: record the model per row.

7. Settlement instructions and messages

7.1 Message catalogue

7.2 Settlement instruction content

7.3 Version management

• Pin the message versions required by each CSD and custodian, and the release calendar of each. Check the usage guidelines published by each infrastructure rather than the latest ISO 20022 catalogue version.
• Keep schemas and validation rules per infrastructure in a versioned repository, with automated tests against the infrastructure's sample messages.

8. T+1 timeline and cut-offs

8.1 Trade-date timeline

Example: EU cash equity, executed on a trading venue, settled at an EU CSD after the T+1 date. Times are illustrative; take the real cut-offs from the CSD and CCP rulebooks.

8.2 Cross-time-zone flows

8.3 Batch-to-event changes

9. Fails, penalties and buy-ins

9.1 Fails prediction

9.2 Cash penalties

Under the CSDR settlement discipline regime, CSDs calculate cash penalties per failing instruction and per business day of the fail, using reference prices and penalty rates set in Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2017/389 as amended. Check the current consolidated text and the CSD's published rates before use; the rate below is invented for illustration and is not the regulatory rate.

Example: a delivery of shares with a settlement value of EUR 2,400,000 fails for 3 business days. With an illustrative rate of 1 basis point per day, the penalty is 2,400,000 x 0.0001 x 3 = EUR 720. The firm receives the amount in the CSD's penalty report, recalculates it, books it to the desk or client that caused the fail, and raises a dispute with the CSD if the recalculation differs.

9.3 Settlement efficiency

Example: on a sample day the firm sent 12,000 instructions due to settle; 11,820 settled on the intended settlement date and 180 failed. Settlement efficiency is 11,820 / 12,000 = 98.5 percent by count. Report the same measure by value, because a few large fails can matter more than many small ones.

Mandatory buy-in rules: the CSDR Refit (Regulation (EU) 2023/2845) made mandatory buy-ins a measure that applies only if the Commission activates it. Check the current status of the regime and any infrastructure rules on buy-ins before designing the process.

10. Reference data

Controls: changes to SSIs require four-eyes approval and an audit trail; a new SSI applies only to trades confirmed after the change; and the settlement cycle per market is a data item with an effective date, so the T+1 switch is a reference data change, not a code release. Master data governance: master data management design (architecture/master-data-management-design).

11. Funding, FX and securities financing

12. Reconciliation and operational controls

General ledger and break management process: account reconciliation (finance/account-reconciliation).

13. Non-functional design, testing and cutover

13.1 Non-functional requirements

13.2 Testing and cutover

Cutover approach: [Example: switch the settlement cycle as a reference data change effective on the migration date; trades executed before the date keep T+2; monitor the first T+1 week with a war room; keep fails and penalties under daily review for one month.] Runbook: cutover plan (project/cutover-plan).

14. Deadline register

15. Traceability matrix

16. Glossary and references

16.1 Glossary

16.2 References

Standard and licence note

Based on public legal texts (SEC Rule 15c6-1 as amended by Release 34-96930, Regulation (EU) 2025/2075 and the CSDR), the FIX Protocol message names published by the FIX Trading Community and ISO 20022 message identifiers. Message names and identifiers are used for reference only; no specification, rulebook or legal text is reproduced, and all descriptions are original text written for this collection. Check the current official texts, infrastructure rulebooks and usage guidelines before use, because settlement rules and dates change. This is a documentation format, not legal or financial advice; consult a qualified professional. FIX and the infrastructure names are trademarks of their owners; this template is not affiliated with or endorsed by them. Template licence: MIT.