Opening, Closing and Forward Available Balances in the SWIFT MT940 Format

In the SWIFT MT940 format specifications, there are four fields for balances: F60a Opening Balance, F62a Closing Balance (Booked Funds), F64 Closing Available Balance (Available Funds) and F65 Forward Available Balance. The aim of this article is to explain the meaning of each balance field and how they are calculated.

This will be illustrated through SWIFT MT940 statements sent to a financial institution authorised by account owner to receive it.

SWIFT MT940 sent to Bank authorized by account owner
SWIFT MT940 sent to Bank authorized by account owner

Two MT940 are sent to Midland bank authorized by Transglobal Corp to receive it. Balance fields are provided in each SWIFT MT940 format received. Considering the two messages is helpful to better understand how the balances are computed.

Balances in the first SWIFT MT940 format

The table below contains the fields that are transported in the first SWIFT MT940 format. For format of balances and line statements fields, please refer to the previous article or to the SWIFT MT940 format specifications. The main goal here is to explain how the balances are calculated. This account statement is sent on september 10.

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We see something pretty interesting about the balances. Funds can be booked on a account with different value dates. When funds are booked with a value date in the future, the funds become available only at value date. So the account owner cannot spend the money before value date.

Balances in the second SWIFT MT940 format

The table below contains the fields that are transported in the second SWIFT MT940 format. This second statement contains only one debit entry, but it affects the other balances as you can see below. This account statement is sent on september 11.

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In conclusion, Opening and Closing balances are given for the statement date, but computed irrespective of the value dates. Forward available balances are always considered at a specific value date. To get the closing or forward available balance for a date, funds available after that date must be deducted from the total closing balance.

Simple amounts were used to make things easy and help you to follow the calculation of the different balances. If something is still unclear, please send your question through a comment. We will be happy to support.

9 COMMENTS

  1. Hi Paul, is there any restriction on number of entries a mt940 can have due to the fact that one mt940 can only have 2000 characters.
    Thanks
    Pramod

    • Hi Pramod,
      One single MT940 message can have up to 2000 characters.
      But you can send multiple MT940 for the same statement (See Statement Number/Sequence Number).
      If the number of entries is very high, you can send as many MT940 as required and increase the sequence number with each new message.
      You can theoretically send up to 99999 sequences for the same statement. That is more than enough in practice.
      BR, Jean Paul

  2. I have a question

    We generated MT940 statement for a date range (eg : 01-03- 2019 to 30-04-2019). It is split into multiple messages.

    In all the messages, the Intermediate Account opening balance tag (Tag 60M ) is always populating date as 01-03- 2019 and Intermediate Account closing balance(Tag 62M) is always populating as 30-04-2019, whereas the balances are populating as per the corresponding opening date and closing date of transaction in a message.

    Is this the correct functionality?” or 60M and 62M tags date should also update

    • Hi Anoop,
      Sorry for not answering before. I am very busy at the moment.

      To be strict, the date of the Intermediate Account opening balance tag (Tag 60M) should ideally take the date of the last (debit or credit) entry and the date of the Intermediate Account closing balance(Tag 62M) should also ideally take the date of the last (debit or credit) entry.
      That totally makes sense. In reality, people do not care that much about those dates as long as the balances are correct. What truly matters in a statement are the dates of the opening and closing balances.
      Dates of Closing Available Balance and Forward Available Balance are really important too. They must be correct. If you can easily fix the dates of intermediate balances, do it. Receivers won’t waste time asking themselves the same question.

      Regards,
      Jean Paul

  3. Hello, can you please assist in below case.

    While we send the statement that consists of two MT940 messages, the client doesn’t receve the second one. In both messages we use tag 62F showing closing balance, should it be 62M in first message? Can this be a reason that the client’s system can’t generate the second message? Also we put 64tag in both messages, can this be a reson for non receiving the second message?

    Thank you.

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