Broker research firm First Call has confirmed its support for RIXML.org, a global industry association of buy side and sell side firms developing an open standard for the electronic exchange of investment research.
"With this endorsement of RIXML, First Call has demonstrated its commitment to supporting a broad and public effort to create an XML-based standard," says David Seibert, vice president, investment systems at US brokerage T Rowe Price and buy-side co-chair of the RIXML.org steering committee.
In June, First Call issued a draft Document Type Definition (DTD) intended to facilitate industry dialogue on the creation of XML standards for electronic information exchange.
Doug Morgan, executive vice president of First Call Broker Services, comments: "We strongly believe that it's important for the industry to adopt a structured content standard - this will facilitate the exchange of information and will allow market participants to fully leverage the benefits of XML technology."
A broadly accepted XML standard will ensure that the independent components of a research document are structured and identified in a consistent manner across all organisations. The idea is to facilitate the exchange and customisation of information, as the components may be parsed and repackaged to meet each recipient's distinct requirements. XML-formatted documents can also be converted to the formats specified by recipients and delivered seamlessly over a variety of platforms, including the Web and wireless devices.