Citadel Signs 10-Year Data Management Services Agreement with Accenture

Accenture (NYSE: ACN) and Citadel Investment Group , LLC havesigned a ten-year agreement under which Accenture will manage keyaspects of Citadel's financial data management processes to helpCitadel enhance the quality of its market information and securegreater returns from its data operations.

The agreement involves a crucial type of financial informationknown as "reference data," which are the permanent codes, identifiers,descriptive information and historical data about stocks, bonds andother financial instruments. Reference data comprise 40 percent of theinformation involved in every trade and include the identity, origin,ownership, pricing history and legal terms and conditions of allsecurities.

Under the agreement, Accenture will provide Citadel with a managedservice for consolidating, validating, enhancing published referencedata. The service, known as Accenture Managed Reference Data Service,will provide Citadel with a full suite of data management, informationtechnology (IT), vendor management and performance measurementservices. It is the financial industry's first multi-source managedservice for referential data on global equities, fixed income, andderivative securities that includes pricing data, fundamentalsecurities data, and global corporate actions with both automated andmanual data cleansing, validation and enrichment.

Unlike traditional on-site reference data solutions, AccentureManaged Reference Data Service operates on a centralized,"one-to-many" basis to maximize cost and operational efficienciesthrough economies of scale. The service will support Citadel'sincoming reference data feeds from multiple sources, including marketdata vendors, corporate actions data vendors, exchanges and othercommercial and public sources.

"We are delighted to partner with Accenture in this criticallyimportant endeavor," said Tom Miglis, Chief Information Officer atCitadel. "Their global presence and commitment to this business willfurther enhance our ability to research and analyze investmentopportunities and improve our trade-processing capabilities."

"Data is the lifeblood of the capital markets industry, and poorquality reference data are a major obstacle to regulatory complianceand operational efficiency," said Bill Cline, managing partner ofAccenture's global Capital Markets practice. "Citadel recognizes thatthe degree of quality, speed, consistency, and automation in datamanagement and core business processes has a direct correlation tohigh performance. We are pleased to have such a distinguishedinstitution and innovator as our charter client."

Accurate and accessible reference data are necessary for properportfolio valuation, successful trade execution, effective financialrisk management, and compliance with major new financial regulationssuch as Basel II, EU Markets in Financial Data Instruments Directive(MiFID), Sarbanes-Oxley, USA Patriot Act, and the UK Anti-MoneyLaundering Act.

"Historically, reference data management in the capital marketsindustry has been fragmented, inconsistent, costly and error-prone,"said Patricia Tsien, partner in charge of Accenture Managed ReferenceData Service. "With one-third of trade execution problems caused byreference data errors and with new and unprecedented regulatorystandards for data quality, we believe centralized reference datamanagement will soon be synonymous with high performance in the globalcapital markets."

Accenture Managed Reference Data Service centralizes thetechnology infrastructure, data cleansing operations, vendormanagement and quality management of reference data forbroker-dealers, banks, asset managers, hedge funds, insurancecompanies, and capital markets infrastructure and service providers.It is designed to help firms migrate from fragmented data environmentsto a more streamlined, scalable data management architecture, theservice consists of:

-- Data validation, enrichment, integration and "permissioning" services. Built with Asset Control's AC Plus enterprise-wide data management solution, the automated service receives data feeds from clients' multiple vendors and proprietary sources; conforms and consolidates the data; removes and corrects incomplete, inaccurate, inconsistent and duplicate data; produces a cleansed and validated "golden copy" of the data; and sorts and organizes the data for delivery to clients.

-- Data cleansing operations. In addition to automated cleansing, the service provides manual cleansing and validation in 15 languages via Accenture's reference data delivery centers based in North America, Asia and Europe.

-- "Grid"-based infrastructure. Technology infrastructure is based on Sun Microsystems' pay-for-use "grid," which includes end-to-end hardware, software, storage, network and services, running on Sun Solaris 10 Operating System, Opteron- and SPARC-based servers. Sun's grid provides demand-based flexibility and scalability, allowing the service to scale transparently for multiple financial firms at a greatly reduced cost to clients.

-- Market data administration. Data administration services help to support clients in managing multiple market data vendor contracts and in monitoring service level quality and commitments under existing client-vendor contracts.

-- IT support and services. Accenture's Global Delivery Network, which consists of 40 service centers worldwide, provides 24-hour IT and service support.

-- Leading data support. Accenture Managed Reference Data Service supports market information feeds from the world's leading market data vendors.

Accenture Managed Reference Data Service represents more than adecade of insights and know-how in managed data services. In 1992,Accenture assumed responsibility for market data operations at one ofthe world's largest exchanges. Since then, several of the world'slargest financial institutions have sourced their entire trading floorand market data operations to Accenture. In 2004, Accenture and AssetControl agreed to jointly market and implement Accenture ManagedReference Data Service on a worldwide basis.

About Accenture

Accenture is a global management consulting, technology servicesand outsourcing company. Committed to delivering innovation, Accenturecollaborates with its clients to help them become high-performancebusinesses and governments. With deep industry and business processexpertise, broad global resources and a proven track record, Accenturecan mobilize the right people, skills and technologies to help clientsimprove their performance. With more than 115,000 people in 48countries, the company generated net revenues of US$13.67 billion forthe fiscal year ended Aug. 31, 2004. Its home page iswww.accenture.com.

About Citadel Investment Group, LLC

Founded in 1990, Citadel Investment Group, L.L.C. conducts itsactivities through several affiliates that invest over $12 billion ininvestment capital across nearly every major asset class around theworld. Citadel currently accounts for approximately three percent ofthe total daily Dollar volume traded on both the New York StockExchange and NASDAQ. Headquartered in Chicago, Citadel employsapproximately 1,000 people worldwide and maintains offices in NewYork, San Francisco, Tokyo, Hong Kong and London.