Foundation of the IPF Association

LONDON, March 8, 2010 - On Wednesday 24 February 2010, in London, 21 leading banks, clearing
houses and associated payment service providers formed the International
Payments Framework Association (IPFA).

At the inaugural meeting the members of the IPFA elected a Board of
Directors for a three year term to govern the affairs of the association. The
board consists of representatives from six banking institutions and three
clearing houses (CSMs). Arthur Cousins of Standard Bank of South Africa was
elected Chairman of the board and Michael Steinbach of Equens was elected
Vice-Chairman of the board.

The prime purpose of the IPFA is to provide business rules, standards and
operating procedures to improve non-urgent cross border credit transfers
based on the ISO 20022 message standard through a contractual framework
binding the members to these business rules, standards and operating
procedures.

April 2010 will see the commencement of live traffic between two IPFA
members. The Federal Reserve Bank in Atlanta, USA (FED) and Equens in Europe
will start with exchanging both USD and EUR payments between the USA and
Europe. Thereafter these members will expand the processing to other European
currencies as well.

Several IPFA members have commenced planning for the inclusion, into the
framework, of the currencies of the following countries; Brazil, Canada,
Mexico and South Africa during 2010/2011.

Website: www.internationalpaymentsframework.org

Contact: Manfred Schuck, Telephone: +49-69-58-99-93; Further information regarding the IPFA can be either obtained from our website www.internationalpaymentsframework.org or by contacting us via E-mail at info at internationalpaymentsframework.org