Headlines:
Iceland Banks to Use Norkom Software
The Central Bank of Iceland and three banking companies in that country have agreed to use anti-money laundering software from Norkom Technologies Inc.
The agreements, which the Boston vendor announced Monday, were negotiated through the Icelandic Banks Data Centre, a Reykjavik processor, as a single contract. Norkom did not give a price.
The software will be installed over the next nine months at the central bank, as well as at Landsbanki Islands HF, Glitnir Bank, and Sparisjodabanki Islands HF, which operates under the Icebank brand.
Norkom's software uses behavioral profiling and a watch list to spot money laundering and create alerts for bank investigators.
Swift to Send Messages via New Language
The international wire transfer organization Swift plans to start using the financial products markup language this year to transmit SwiftNet messages for the automatic processing of financial derivatives.
The Belgian bank-owned organization announced last week that it had established a closed user group in conjunction with the International Swaps and Derivatives Association Inc. of New York to support the messaging initiative.
Swift, formally known as the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, has supported the use of FpML as an industry standard for financial swaps, derivatives and structured products. The language, a dialect of extensible markup language, tags individual data elements so that different computer systems can process the files.
Swift, which serves 7,800 financial institutions in 200 countries, said it expected the initiative to bring new users to its network.
