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AS – Administration Services. 2006, Administration Services GmbH (AS) completed the concentration of production activities in Vienna as planned. This was a major step toward further optimising production processes and put order processing on a low-cost high-quality basis. Cooperation with the Czech BA-CA subsidiary BTS (Banking Transaction Services) was successfully started. The first step was to transfer to BTS voucher data recording for international payments. Technical implementation has been completed; following a trial period, BTS will assume responsibility for the process. BA-CA will draw on experience gained in this area to set up further cooperation arrangements with providers in Central and Eastern Europe.
BTS – Banking Transaction Services. In the first half of 2006, the entire back-office settlement activities of the two banking subsidiaries in the Czech Republic were spun off to the Group’s subsidiary Banking Transaction Services s.r.o. (BTS), which is located in Prague. The card processing centres of the two Czech banks were combined within BTS. Established in July 2005 as the Group-shared service centre for CEE in the areas of international payments and card processing, BTS steadily expanded its activities in 2006 to provide services to 8 banks in the area of payment services and 3 banks in card processing. With close to 300 employees, BTS serves 11 customers, one of which is not a member of UniCredit Group, in 9 countries.
TSS – Treasury and Securities Services. 2006 saw an increase in securities settlement activities, both in terms of quantity and quality. The volume of securities held in safe-custody accounts rose by 17% in 2006, with mutual fund holdings up by 9%. Transaction volume increased by 34% for safe-custody accounts and by 40% for securities investment plans.
Worldwide electronic reconciliation of credit derivatives with hedge funds is performed with the new DTCC Deriv/SERV product of The Depositary Trust & Clearing Corporation. BA-CA became the first bank in Austria to use the service.
“TSS Active” has been launched with a view to a strategic reorientation which will ensure that, after a consolidation phase, operations are well positioned to meet requirements within and outside the Group.