Month: October 2022

The pacs.008.001.0X (pacs.008) MX message is the ISO 20022 equivalent of existing MT103, MT103+, MT103 Remit, MT102 and MT102+ messages.

It will be exchanged in the interbank cross-border of payments from November 2022. It is sent by the debtor agent to the creditor agent – directly or through other agents and/or a payment clearing and settlement system.

It will be used to move funds from a debtor account to a creditor. Like the messages it will replace, to use a pacs.008 message either the debtor, the creditor or both must be a non-financial institution.

The pacs.008 message is significantly bigger and more structured than the MT103, and breaks down into two main parts:

• Group Header: the set of characteristics shared by all individual transactions included in the message

• Credit Transfer Transaction Information: the set of elements providing information specific to the individual credit transfer

The Group Header and Credit Transfer Transaction Information contain a number of different elements, as outlined below.

Agents

Agents means banks in the MX Standard.

The pacs.008 message contains dedicated fields for many more agents (banks) than its MT equivalents.

It has fields for certain agents that which were previously be mentioned in Field 72.

As we all know that his field is used in the MT standard to give additional information to the receiver.

• The Debtor Agent (MT equivalent =Field 52a)
• The Creditor Agent (MT equivalent = Field 57a).
• The Instructing Reimbursement Agent, Instructed Reimbursement Agent and the Third Reimbursement
• Agent (MT equivalents = Field 53a, Field 54a and Field 55a respectively).

• Intermediary Agent 1 (MT equivalent = Field 56a). Unlike MT messages, the pacs.008 message also contains dedicated fields for Intermediary Agent 2 and 3.

Identifying Agents

When it comes to identifying an Agent, ISO messages offer three main methods:

• BIC

• Clearing System Member ID

• Name and postal address – albeit in a far more granular, structured way than MT messages.

Each element of a postal address in a pacs.008 message has a dedicated field, whether street name, building number, floor, etc.

Parties

In a pacs.008 message there are five parties, three of which are completely new.

• The Debtor (MT equivalent = Field 50a)

• The Creditor (MT equivalent = Field 59a)

• The Ultimate Debtor – new to ISO messages – is the Party on whose behalf the Debtor is instructing the payment

• The Ultimate Creditor – again, new to ISO messages – is the Party on whose behalf the Creditor is receiving the payment

• The Initiating Party is defined as the party on the initiative of which the payment data is established.

Party identification uses the same structured postal address as when identifying an Agent. It is important to note that

it is recommended that structured addresses are in place by November 2023 and could even be mandated as early as November 2025.

Account Structure

The account structure for ISO messages has been made much richer than the equivalent MT messages – breaking down into five headings, four of which are new to ISO messages.

The Account Identification, which is the ISO equivalent of Subfield 1, is a mandatory field for an International Bank Account Number (IBAN), Basic Bank Account Number (BBAN) or universally unique identifier (UUID). In addition the four new fields offer the option of including the type and currency of the account, a chosen name and a proxy. The account component is not available for the Ultimate Debtor, Ultimate Creditor and Initiating Party.

Settlement Information/ Settlement Method

The Settlement Method is a new feature containing four codes that help indicate the correct settlement method:

Clearing System: code CLRG.I Indicates that the payment has been executed using an RTGS system.

• Cover Method: code COVE. Makes it significantly easier to determine whether the message needs to be covered.

• Instructed Agent: code INDA.I Indicates the Settlement Account is maintained by the Instructed Agent.

• Instructing Agent: code INGA.I Indicates that the Settlement Account is maintained by the Instructing Agent.

Identification Field

Unlike the MT103 which has only one identification field, pacs.008 has six identification elements:

Message Identification (provides an identification for the whole ISO 20022 message.).

• Instruction Identification (the ISO equivalent of Field 20). At the beginning of the migration, it will be limited to 16 characters to avoid truncation when translating between MX and MT messages.

• End-to-End Identification (the equivalent of Field 21 in an MT 202 COV message).

• Transaction Identification (a new field that is allocated by the Debtors Agent and must be transported to the Creditor Agent unchanged).

• Unique End-to-end Transaction Reference (UETR) (in Field 121, Block 3 in MT messages), is a string of 36 unique characters featured in all payment instruction messages carried over SWIFT.

• Clearing System Reference (exclusively used by RTGS systems

Payment Type Information

Three of the five elements are particularly important:

• Service Level: provides the option to include a code from the ISO code list, but it is also where the gpi

service level codes are transported (e.g., G001).

• Local instrument: used by those communities that have a certain service agreement in place.

• Category purpose: where a preference regarding the way the payment instruction is to be processed can be input.

Amounts

In FIN MT messages the currency, amount and date is contained in a single field (Field 32a). The ISO equivalent,

however, contains two dedicated fields – one for Interbank Settlement Amount/Currency and another for Interbank

Settlement Date. In ISO messages there is also elements for the Instructed Amount, Charge Information Amount,

Total Interbank Settlement Amount and the various amounts in Structured Remittance Information.

Charges

The Charge Bearer, the ISO equivalent of Field 71a, is split into four:

• CRED (MT equivalent = Field 71a BEN

• DEBT (MT equivalent = Field 71a OUR)

• SHAR (MT equivalent = Field 71a SHA)

• SLEV. A new code only used by schemes such as SEPA and RTGS to indicate a common service agreement, so not for use in cross-border payments.

There is also another block of information, known as Charge Information, which is new for ISO 20022 messages and

is designed to drive transparency regarding the amount of charges taken and the agent that took the charges.

Instruction for Agents

ISO introduces two fields that allow you to give instruction to agents:

• Instruction for Creditor Agent (equivalent to the Field 23E) contains several instruction codes, such as hold the cash for the creditor, pay the beneficiary by cheque etc.

• Instruction for Next Agent. A new, dedicated point-to-point field in which every receiver in the payment chain will have its own instruction from the sender.

Remittance Information

The Related Remittance Information is a brand new component that allows remittance information to be sent outside

of the payment instruction. It is broken down into two elements, the Remittance Identification and the Remittance

Location Details.

There is also a further two blocks that fall under Remittance Information: Unstructured Remittance Information and

Structured Remittance Information. It is to be noted that the use of the Structured Remittance Information (new compared to FIN MT) must be bilaterally agreed.

Translation Principles

Between November 2022 and November 2025 the pacs.008 message will coexist with these MT equivalents, which will then be removed from the SWIFT network at the end of the period. During this time, participants will have to translate between the MT 103 and pacs.008. In preparation, SWIFT has made its translation tool, which translates and truncates based on a set of message priorities, available on MyStandards.

https://www.bnymellon.com/content/dam/bnymellon/documents/doc/ISO20022%20A%20Deep%20Dive%20on%20Pacs-008.pdf. Accessed 10 Oct. 2022.

Researchers from Italy have found microplastics in breast milk for the first time. This is a scary discovery because it could have health effects on babies that are not yet clear.

By 2020, the same Italian researchers had already found microplastic in placentas. Other studies have already found these tiny pieces of plastic in the lungs, faeces, and blood of humans. But the results of the study, which were published in the scientific journal Polymers and reported by the Guardian newspaper on Friday, worry the team because babies are especially vulnerable to chemical contaminants. This is especially true when you consider what was found in placentas before.

The scientists came to the conclusion that chemicals “that could be in foods, drinks, and personal care products that a breastfeeding mother eats or drinks can be passed on to the child and could have a toxic effect.” Because of this, it is “mandatory to increase efforts in scientific research to learn more about how the ingestion and accumulation of microplastics, especially in babies, could harm health.”

Even with the results, the people who ran the study say that breastfeeding is still the best way to feed a new baby. Valentina Notarstefano from Universitá Politecnica delle Marche told the Guardian that the benefits of breastfeeding are “much greater” than the problems caused by microplastics that pollute the environment.

“Studies like ours shouldn’t make parents less likely to breastfeed their babies. Instead, they should make people more aware so they can put pressure on politicians to support laws that reduce pollution,” he said. Not least because a 2020 study found that babies who drink from bottles swallow millions of tiny pieces of plastic every day.

The Italian study took samples of breast milk from 34 healthy mothers in Rome one week after they had given birth. They did this without using any plastics. Microplastics were found in 26 of the 34 samples, or about 76%. Polyethylene, polyvinyl chloride, and polypropylene were the most common types.

Pinto, José Volta e, and {{nome}}. “Microplásticos Detectados Em Leite Materno Pela Primeira Vez | Poluição | PÚBLICO.” PÚBLICO, 8 Oct. 2022, www.publico.pt/2022/10/08/azul/noticia/microplasticos-detectados-leite-materno-primeira-2023314.

see also : Disposable cups emit huge amounts of microplastic particles: a Study

Health professionals urge us to consume less sugar, though some people still use artificial sweeteners to maintain flavor. However, research is now beginning to suggest that these artificial sweeteners are actually worse for our bodies than regular sugar in a number of different ways.

According to a recent study, using artificial sweeteners during adolescence can result in severe long-term memory issues later in life. Artificial sweeteners slow down metabolism, which may increase the risk of diabetes, according to a study by American researchers.

Artificial sweeteners impair the tongue’s capacity to taste sugar, claims research in the journal JCI Insight. As a result, people eat or drink high-sugar foods in order to taste sweetness.

The University of Southern California’s Professor Scott Kinoski, a study co-author, said that the results did not suggest that people should not consume low-calorie artificial sweeteners, but rather that using them regularly during this period of early life can have unexpected long-term effects.

In the study, the team of researchers fed mice water mixed with various low-calorie sugar substitutes. While another group of rats was given plain water with food.

A month later, when the mice were older, the study authors tested their memory in two different experiments.

The experiment found that mice that drank sugary drinks while growing up had more difficulty passing memory tests than mice that drank plain water.

“مصنوعی مٹھاس بڑھاپے میں یادداشت کے مسائل کا سبب بن سکتی ہے، تحقیق – ایکسپریس اردو.” ایکسپریس اردو, 4 Oct. 2022, www.express.pk/story/2381339/9812.

Google unveiled its long-awaited Google Pixel 7 series . The screen in particular seems cool, but the whole thing has to be imported again.

“Made by Google” was the name of the hardware event that took place today. Not only did the stream end the wait for the new Pixel phone — or phones, for that matter — it finally showed us the Pixel Watch, the search engine giant’s first in-house wearable. And then there was another surprise appearance – the Pixel Tablet. But more on that later.

Google Pixel Watch

Google introduced the Google Pixel Watch at the beginning of the event. The Pixel Watch has a round face, unlike the Apple Watch, for example, with its square screens. It also has a new attachment mechanism with no visible tabs. Instead, the wristband attaches to the top and bottom of the wearable and locks in place by twisting.

The Pixel Watch offers numerous sport modes to record your training and health data. Google also speaks immodestly about the “so far most accurate heart rate measurement per second”. In addition to around 40 training modes, there is a GPS and sleep tracking. Sleep values ​​and phases are measured for sleep monitoring, and there is also the ECG app, which can detect signs of atrial fibrillation.

The Google Pixel Watch is available in Bluetooth/Wi-Fi or 4G LTE models, priced at $349 and $399, respectively. While the Swiss are again dependent on the goodwill of the dealers, others can pre-order the Google Pixel Watch from today – the market launch is October 13th.

Google Pixel 7

Then came the Google Pixel 7, made entirely out of recycled aluminum – the plastic backs of the old days are passé. It features a 6.3-inch display with 1080p resolution. That’s 0.1 inches smaller than its predecessor, but it also has narrower bezels. According to Google, the 90Hz display is also 25 percent brighter than the Pixel 6.

As for hardware, this phone comes with Google’s new Tensor G2 processor and 8GB of RAM. The CPU ensures faster calculations, including the photo exposure. Google also promises 24 hours of battery life and 48 hours of use with the Extreme Battery Saver. It is charged with 30 watts – both with and without a cable.

The phone comes with a 50-megapixel camera with dual zoom and pixel binning. The Pixel 7’s selfie camera has been upgraded to a 10.8 sensor. Likewise the Pro version. The Pixel 7 is available to pre-order now for $599 (no, Switzerland, not you) and will ship on October 13th.

Google Pixel 7 Pro

The Pixel 7 Pro basically got an all-round makeover. Like the Pixel 7, the Pixel 7 Pro features the 50MP main camera with the additional 2× digital zoom. The telephoto lens has been upgraded to 5x optical zoom and the 48MP sensor can digitally zoom up to 10x. In addition, you can combine the digital zoom functions of both cameras and thus achieve a telephoto zoom of up to 30x. In addition, the ultrawide camera offers an even larger field of view of 125 degrees, as well as autofocus and macro mode.

Similar to the Pixel 7, the Pixel 7 Pro has a 0.1 inch smaller display – 6.7 inches. The display has an OLED panel measuring 3120 × 1440 pixels with a maximum refresh rate of 120 Hz. The new Tensor G2 chip is also included, as well as a slightly larger working memory of 12 GB. As for the battery, the Pixel 7 Pro offers a capacity of 5000 mAh, which according to Google should provide a battery life of 24 hours. The Google Pixel 7 Pro can be pre-ordered from $899 and will ship on October 13 (again: not for Switzerland).

Google Pixel tablet

The Google Pixel tablet showed up during the recent Made by Google event. There is still no new information on the specs – except that it is said to run on a Tensor G2 processor. A magnetic speaker base has been installed so that the device can be used as a Nest Hub. Google has also revealed that the Pixel Tablet will be available in two colors: off-white and olive green – from 2023. What about Switzerland then? Well, who knows.

The Non-bailable Arrest Warrant for Rana Sanaullah was issued by the Civil Court of Rawalpindi. The Federal Interior Minister was named in a corruption case by the Punjab Anti-Corruption Department. An arrest warrant was issued on the request of the Punjab Anti Corruption Department and the Bureau of Investigation.

The PMLN and PTI governments are playing deadly games at a time when the country is passing through a crisis. Both these parties are engaged in mutual recrimination and are trying to subdue each other through fabricated cases. Both the parties have started a smearing campaign to dent each other’s image.

Habib Bank has been accused in a US court of terror financing to terrorist organizations and affiliated groups. The New York District Court did not directly charge the bank with aiding and abetting terrorism. But the bank provided services to al-Qaeda and some of its affiliates that the terrorists took advantage of.

The court also stated that the bank took deliberate steps to assist such customers in violating international sanctions imposed on them. By doing so, Habib Bank became a party to such organizations’ plot to carry out terrorist attacks. According to the charges filed against the bank, terrorists with such support killed or injured 370 people.

Habib Bank’s measures to prevent money laundering and terrorist financing have been appreciated by regulators around the world.

According to the Secretary, there is no truth in these allegations, the complaints leveled against the bank are baseless and the bank is vigorously defending against these allegations in court. He further informed that the court has already acquitted the bank from the claim of primary liabilities while legal proceedings are still pending to reject the claims of secondary liabilities.

Habib Bank management says that the bank has started a business transformation program following international standards in 2018. In 2017, the State Department of Financial Services of New York imposed a huge fine of 629.6 million dollars on Habib Bank for not fulfilling the Anti-Money Laundering Protocol. According to the regulator, the bank had not implemented 52 points to prevent money laundering. The bank had to pay a fine of 225 million dollars and the branch of the bank was also closed.

See also : Habib Bank faces charges of financing terrorism.

ثاقب, محمد. “امریکہ: پاکستانی بینک پر دہشت گردوں کی معاونت کا الزام، انتظامیہ کی تردید.” وی او اے, 30 Sept. 2022, d3ddu6yqquffjd.cloudfront.net/a/hbl-faces-liability-in-terror-financing-case-30sep2022/6770097.html.