The Case for FIX 5.0

The regular release of extension packs, which offer additional functionality and are available for adoption as soon as they are developed, incorporate new functionalities and message tags, which encourage standardization at the industry level and discourages members from having to develop non-standard custom tags. Also, separate release and versioning of the packs for application layer and session layer allows foraddressing requirements specific to application and session layer.

Migration to FIX 5.0

While the market participants are well defined by their roles and functions, the multitude of protocols (proprietary and industry standard) and their non-uniform adoption creates complexities that the members need to address in order to conduct business seamlessly.

FIX 5.0 and FIXT.1.1 give the industry an opportunity to transform their communication and messaging infrastructure, reaping the benefits of reduced cost of maintenance of bespoke versions, improved connectivity and interoperability between counterparties, lower costs in testing and faster roll out, bandwidth conservation, latency reduction, automation and straight through processing (STP). Since FIX is only prescriptive and not mandatory, market participants are free to choose their adoption based on their individual business requirements and priorities. While each market participant has its own strategy for the use of protocols, it is evident that a collective industry effort would yield maximum benefit for participants.