Sixty per cent of investment firms have started budgeting for technology projects in 2006 to prepare for the upcoming Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID), according to research published this week.

This budgeting is occurring despite the fact that 80 per cent of those firms polled either do not have, or do not know if they have, a relevant compliance framework for the directive in place.

MiFID continues the process of creating a single European market for financial services, and will require investment firms to implement a number of changes in how they operate, such as keeping detailed information for up to five years on trades they have made.

For many companies, the directive will require significant investment in their ability to store, retain and analyse data.

But the MiFID Readiness Survey, produced by the MiFID Joint Working Group and sponsored by Standard & Poor’s, Oracle UK and BT Radianz, says just 20 per cent of respondents have a unified data storage strategy in place.

Not much time for preparation remains; although the regulations are not due to be completely finalised until March next year, the directive’s deadline is 30
April 2007.