The London Stock Exchange's UnaVista has been given Approved Reporting Mechanism status for transaction reporting by the Financial Services Authority.In addition to providing the basic validation services required under MiFID, UnaVista will offer firms validation tools to monitor the quality of their transaction reports, reducing the risk of providing incorrect data to the FSA.

UnaVista is the exchange's secure web based platform for validation, matching and reconciliation. UnaVista offers a number of solutions including transaction reporting, post trade confirmations, reconciliation, and reference data management.

Kevin Milne, director of post trade services at the exchange, said: "This new service will offer UnaVista's clients a functionally rich and flexible approach to transaction reporting. With UnaVista exceeding the level of validation mandated by regulators, firms using our transaction reporting service will be able to reduce the risks and costs associated with incorrect, late or duplicate reporting."

The exchange has offered a transaction reporting service known as the Exchange Reporting Service since 2002. ERS was approved by FSA as an ARM when this requirement was introduced as part of MiFID. After consultation with major financial institutions the ERS service has been migrated on to the UnaVista platform.