Home > Middle office > Instruments > The AFT's information system
| A modernised information system |    |
Work on upgrading the information system begun by Agence France Trésor in 2004 continued in 2010. Pursuing the SIFT project, which came on stream last year in a production-maintenance mode of operation, AFT’s IT team started work on upgrading access for financial information providers, mainly Bloomberg and Thomson Reuters.
A new redundant and remotely administered Reuters infrastructure was implemented in the first half of 2010. The same applied to Bloomberg access, the bandwidth of which was doubled in order to give market operators more fluid access to information sources at a time when access to market information is more vital than ever.
Overview of the SIFT project
The SIFT system built by AFT provides secure, crosssector, user-friendly and open-ended management of the State’s market transactions (issuance, proactive debt management, investment of cash holdings), and automatic recording of AFT’s transactions in the State’s accounting system. SIFT also tracks the State’s account with the Banque de France, providing cash position forecasts, real-time monitoring of account transactions and investment decision-making aids.
Agence France Trésor’s information system has been completely recast in a process that started in 2002 with several major objectives, including meeting AFT’s operational needs, providing integrated management to unify information sources and limiting the need to re-enter data. The information system is made up of three interconnected applications.
The SIFT-Trading module tracks AFT’s market transactions from the initial trade to posting in the State’s accounts.
The SIFT-Cash Management module manages the State’s cash position, except for investment transactions and BTF issuance, which are handled by the SIFT-Trading module.
The SIFT-Data Centre module compiles all internal and external data for historical and forecasting purposes.
BUSINESS CONTINUITY PLAN
AFT, like investment service providers, is required to have a business continuity plan under the terms of banking regulations (CRBF Regulations 1997-02 and 2004-02) that apply to AFT under the “Cost of Debt Service and the State’s Cash Position” programme.
AFT’s business continuity plan is in three parts:
• local back-up aimed at minimising recovery times after an incident, mainly by providing alternative equipment and hardware (electricity, air conditioning, telecom lines and servers);
• close back-up to counter the risk of the main site becoming temporarily unavailable;
• regional remote back-up, the primary objective of which is to withstand a major disaster.
In addition to recurrent actions aimed at consolidating the security of its main site for local back-up, AFT’s IT team also looks to maintain the regional remote backup site in operational conditions.
For the close back-up site, AFT has started to update the agreement concluded with the Banque de France to cover the risk of its main site becoming temporarily unavailable.
This measure is essentially intended to cover the following aspects:
• guaranteeing AFT access to the Banque de France’s securities auction system;
• monitoring changes in the Treasury account at the Banque de France;
• maintaining post-market activity, in particular the securities settlement system.
The principles of the regional remote back-up site were established in September 2007. AFT’s IT unit concentrated on consolidating the solution in 2010 with the aim of maintaining state-of-the-art functionalities.
The main features of the regional solution are as follows:
• a close partnership with the Public Finances Directorate General (DGFiP):
- AFT’s back-up is hosted entirely by the DGFiP, which has actively contributed to its development;
- associated DGFiP services (methodology, operations, tc.) have supported the introduction of this emergency solution;
- AFT and DGFiP have concluded a long-term partnership agreement setting out the terms;
• hosting of technical facilities on the National Security Site, existing as a back-up for the DGFiP. The site houses teams able to access and monitor AFT’s hardware;
• a back-up user site for AFT hosted by DGFiP’s IT department in Tours, which meets the requirements in terms of distance from Paris and AFT, but also satisfies the need for easy access;
• a link between the two sites, based on DGFiP’s extended network (Rubis);
• formalisation of triggers, procedures for returning to the main site and in general all procedures for a resumption of business, which are an integral part of the BCP.
The diagram below shows these various aspects:
MAJ : 02 Jan. 2012
A new redundant and remotely administered Reuters infrastructure was implemented in the first half of 2010. The same applied to Bloomberg access, the bandwidth of which was doubled in order to give market operators more fluid access to information sources at a time when access to market information is more vital than ever.
Overview of the SIFT project
The SIFT system built by AFT provides secure, crosssector, user-friendly and open-ended management of the State’s market transactions (issuance, proactive debt management, investment of cash holdings), and automatic recording of AFT’s transactions in the State’s accounting system. SIFT also tracks the State’s account with the Banque de France, providing cash position forecasts, real-time monitoring of account transactions and investment decision-making aids.
Agence France Trésor’s information system has been completely recast in a process that started in 2002 with several major objectives, including meeting AFT’s operational needs, providing integrated management to unify information sources and limiting the need to re-enter data. The information system is made up of three interconnected applications.
The SIFT-Trading module tracks AFT’s market transactions from the initial trade to posting in the State’s accounts.
The SIFT-Cash Management module manages the State’s cash position, except for investment transactions and BTF issuance, which are handled by the SIFT-Trading module.
The SIFT-Data Centre module compiles all internal and external data for historical and forecasting purposes.
BUSINESS CONTINUITY PLAN
AFT, like investment service providers, is required to have a business continuity plan under the terms of banking regulations (CRBF Regulations 1997-02 and 2004-02) that apply to AFT under the “Cost of Debt Service and the State’s Cash Position” programme.
AFT’s business continuity plan is in three parts:
• local back-up aimed at minimising recovery times after an incident, mainly by providing alternative equipment and hardware (electricity, air conditioning, telecom lines and servers);
• close back-up to counter the risk of the main site becoming temporarily unavailable;
• regional remote back-up, the primary objective of which is to withstand a major disaster.
In addition to recurrent actions aimed at consolidating the security of its main site for local back-up, AFT’s IT team also looks to maintain the regional remote backup site in operational conditions.
For the close back-up site, AFT has started to update the agreement concluded with the Banque de France to cover the risk of its main site becoming temporarily unavailable.
This measure is essentially intended to cover the following aspects:
• guaranteeing AFT access to the Banque de France’s securities auction system;
• monitoring changes in the Treasury account at the Banque de France;
• maintaining post-market activity, in particular the securities settlement system.
The principles of the regional remote back-up site were established in September 2007. AFT’s IT unit concentrated on consolidating the solution in 2010 with the aim of maintaining state-of-the-art functionalities.
The main features of the regional solution are as follows:
• a close partnership with the Public Finances Directorate General (DGFiP):
- AFT’s back-up is hosted entirely by the DGFiP, which has actively contributed to its development;
- associated DGFiP services (methodology, operations, tc.) have supported the introduction of this emergency solution;
- AFT and DGFiP have concluded a long-term partnership agreement setting out the terms;
• hosting of technical facilities on the National Security Site, existing as a back-up for the DGFiP. The site houses teams able to access and monitor AFT’s hardware;
• a back-up user site for AFT hosted by DGFiP’s IT department in Tours, which meets the requirements in terms of distance from Paris and AFT, but also satisfies the need for easy access;
• a link between the two sites, based on DGFiP’s extended network (Rubis);
• formalisation of triggers, procedures for returning to the main site and in general all procedures for a resumption of business, which are an integral part of the BCP.
The diagram below shows these various aspects:
MAJ : 02 Jan. 2012