GLEIF Enhances its Data Quality Management Program to Maximize Transparency on Data Quality Achieved in the Global LEI System

With its latest monthly data quality reports, GLEIF has introduced several new features which allow a more detailed performance analysis

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A key feature that distinguishes the Legal Entity Identifier (LEI) from other, proprietary identifiers, is that we provide complete transparency regarding the level of data quality achieved in the Global LEI System. We do this by making available the following monthly reports:

• The Global LEI Data Quality Reports demonstrate the overall level of data quality achieved in the Global LEI System.
• The LEI Issuer Data Quality Reports analyze the level of data quality achieved by the individual LEI issuing organizations.

With the latest reports, published on 5 December 2017, the Global Legal Entity Identifier Foundation (GLEIF) has introduced several new features which allow a more detailed performance analysis.

This blog describes the most recent enhancements to GLEIF’s data quality management program, which is designed to continuously optimize the quality, reliability and usability of LEI data. This empowers market participants to benefit from the wealth of information available with the LEI data pool.

The links to the monthly reports and further background material are included in the ‘related links’ below.

New data quality criteria applied to measure the level of data quality in the Global LEI System

To recap: The process of maintaining LEI data quality starts with the registering entity. Through self-registration, the registering entity must supply accurate LEI reference data. The LEI issuing organization (also referenced as ‘Local Operating Unit’) must then verify the LEI reference data with the local authoritative source – a national Business Register, for example – and issue an LEI compliant with the LEI standard.

Once a legal entity has obtained an LEI, it will be published together with the related legal entity reference data by the Local Operating Unit that has issued the LEI. Each Local Operating Unit publishes updated files daily including LEIs it has issued and related reference data. GLEIF makes available the Global LEI Index, which contains historical and current LEI records including related reference data in one authoritative, central repository.

Our data quality management goal is to provide trusted, open and reliable LEI and legal entity reference data. To clarify the concept of data quality with regard to the LEI population, GLEIF has defined, in close dialog with the LEI Regulatory Oversight Committee and the LEI issuing organizations, a set of measurable quality criteria using standards developed by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). These include criteria such as the completeness, comprehensiveness and integrity of the LEI data records. Instituting a set of defined quality criteria establishes a transparent and objective benchmark to assess the level of data quality within the Global LEI System.

With its data quality reports published on 5 December 2017, GLEIF has introduced two new data quality criteria:

• Consistency: The degree to which a unique piece of data holds the same value across multiple data sets.
• Currency: The extent to which data is up-to-date; a data value is up-to-date if it is current for a specific point in time, and it is outdated if it was current at a preceding time but incorrect at a later time.

In total, we have defined 132 data quality checks. Using software developed by GLEIF, the LEI data records, made available by the LEI issuing organizations, are checked against the defined quality criteria. GLEIF sends a daily report detailing the results of the performance assessment to the LEI issuing organizations.

Updated documentation provides detailed information on the methodology applied to assess data quality in the Global LEI System

The document ‘Data Quality Rule Setting’ identifies the checks performed against the quality criteria. The results of the quality assessment reflected within the monthly GLEIF data quality reports are based on the results of these checks. In December 2017, GLEIF published an updated version of the document, which is now fully machine readable.

In addition, GLEIF makes available a ‘Data Quality Report Dictionary’ relevant to, respectively, the Global LEI Data Quality Report and the LEI Issuer Data Quality Reports, which describes the application of the data quality criteria in practice. Any interested party is invited to look up how the figures included in the monthly data quality reports are calculated and how the calculations are implemented. Updated versions of the dictionaries were also published in December 2017.

New and additional information now available with the Global LEI Data Quality Reports

Starting with the reports published on 5 December 2017, which assess the overall data quality in the Global LEI System as of 30 November 2017, the Global LEI Data Quality Reports provide the following existing and new information:

• The LEI Total Data Quality Score for the reporting period. The score represents the percentage of all LEI data records that successfully passed checks performed to identify whether the records meet the defined quality criteria during the reporting period.
• Progress achieved with regard to the continuous optimization of the data quality within the Global LEI System based on the LEI Total Data Quality Score. New: The lowest and highest LEI issuer score achieved in the reporting period is also included.
• New: The Total Data Quality Score per country achieved in the reporting period. The reports now also feature a worldwide LEI data quality country heat map.
• Results of GLEIF checks of the LEI data records against implemented quality criteria, i.e. the percentage of records that successfully passed the tests. New: The reports identify the number of failed checks per data quality criterion and the amount of LEI records affected.
• The percentage of LEI data records which meet the requirements of distinct quality maturity levels. A maturity level chart on the right hand side of the report shows results with regard to the following maturity levels: Level 1 – ‘Required Quality’ (must be 100 percent for all data records); Level 2 – ‘Expected Quality’ (should be 100 percent); Level 3 – ‘Excellent Quality’ (the higher the better). New: The maturity levels of the previous months are shown as a trend.
• New: Information on ‘Level 2’ data, duplicates and challenges for the reporting period. For background information: In May 2017, the process of enhancing the LEI data pool, by including Level 2 data to answer the question of ‘who owns whom’, began. This data allows the identification of the direct and ultimate parents of a legal entity and, vice versa, in order that the entities owned by individual companies can be researched. The ‘duplicates’ section in the report identifies the following issue: In line with applicable policy, one legal entity must only have one LEI. If it is identified that one legal entity has, for example, three LEIs, then two of these will be marked as duplicates. Duplicate LEIs are flagged in the Global LEI Index with the registration status. The centralized challenge facility made available by GLEIF extends the ability to trigger updates of LEI data to all interested parties.
• New: The section ‘Top 5 Failing Checks’ identifies those data quality checks performed by GLEIF which trigger the highest number of LEI records that fail these checks. In the report, the type of data quality check is indicated with a number. The document ‘Data Quality Rule Setting’ indicates which specific check corresponds to the number indicated within the report.

The Global LEI Data Quality Report published on 5 December 2017 shows that the Total Data Quality Score remained above 99 percent even though more than 100,000 LEIs were issued in November 2017 and the assessment was performed based on new and stricter rules.

In 2017, we have demonstrated that performance regarding consistency and plausibility of the data has improved, despite the number of newly issued LEIs being ten times higher than in 2016. GLEIF’s data quality management program is instrumental in ensuring that the LEI remains the best standard available for the provision of open and reliable data for unique identification management.

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