KPMG And Dun & Bradstreet Alliance Addresses FATCA Due Diligence Challenges

NEW YORK and SHORT HILLS, N.J., June 30, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Marking the one-year deadline for foreign financial institutions (FFIs) to identify their preexisting entity account base for purposes of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA), KPMG LLP, the U.S. audit, tax and advisory firm, and Dun & Bradstreet (NYSE: DNB) today announced details around a data-based tool to help global financial institutions meet those requirements.

The D&B FATCA Classifier™ delivered through KPMG LINK simplifies the classification of business entities into categories as required by FATCA and is available now. The deadline for FFIs to complete the remediation exercise for preexisting entity accounts is June 30, 2016.

"Classifying entity accounts to comply with FATCA can be time consuming for financial institutions and cumbersome for their customers. But the financial and reputational implications of not complying with these requirements are significant, and the 2016 deadline is looming," said Jeffrey C. LeSage, Vice Chairman ‒ Tax at KPMG. "The tool uses Dun & Bradstreet's vast library of commercial data to provide clients with a cost-effective approach that can help them reduce risk, save time, enhance customer relations, and instill confidence in their ability to meet regulatory requirements."

The D&B FATCA Classifier™ delivered through KPMG LINK provides FATCA tax classifications for a financial institution's offshore entity customer base via an automated process, which can help reduce the risk of misclassification or the need to ask a customer to self-classify.

"As businesses grow increasingly global in scope and operation, compliance becomes a chief concern of our customers around the world, who can find themselves overwhelmed with regulations that vary from country to country," said Josh Peirez, chief operating officer, Dun & Bradstreet. "We worked with KPMG to develop this tool to ensure that Dun & Bradstreet's deep sets of data can help to provide an accurate FATCA classification of banks' entity account holders, which will help our subscribers meet their FATCA requirements more efficiently." Peirez added, "Dun & Bradstreet is continuing to invest in this area, and this product augments our suite of compliance solutions."

Additional features of the tool include regular monitoring, identifying changes that can impact an assigned FATCA status, delivering results through an online portal, and customized reporting. The alliance draws on KPMG's tax knowledge and extensive FATCA-related project experience and Dun & Bradstreet's leading data sources for commercial information and business insight.

Not permissible for KPMG audit clients and their affiliates.

About the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA)FATCA was enacted into law in 2010 to address the U.S. government's perception of widespread tax evasion by U.S. taxpayers that hold investments offshore. The U.S. Treasury Department and IRS released final regulations in 2013. Stay updated on FATCA issues and insights by visiting the KPMG FATCA Essentials website.

About KPMG LLPKPMG LLP, the audit, tax and advisory firm (www.kpmg.com/us), is the U.S. member firm of KPMG International Cooperative ("KPMG International"). KPMG International's member firms have 162,000 professionals, including more than 9,000 partners, in 155 countries.

About Dun & Bradstreet Dun & Bradstreet (NYSE: DNB) grows the most valuable relationships in business. By uncovering truth and meaning from data, we connect customers with the prospects, suppliers, clients and partners that matter most, and have since 1841. Nearly ninety percent of the Fortune 500, and companies of every size around the world, rely on our data, insights and analytics. For more about Dun & Bradstreet, visit DNB.com. Twitter: @DnBus

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SOURCE KPMG LLP