BIQH validations easily explained

What is a validation and why is it important?

A validation is a defined check that confirms whether incoming market data complies with agreed rules before being used by downstream systems. Validations are essential for maintaining  the integrity, reliability and usability of your data. They act as safeguards, preventing incorrect, incomplete or non-compliant data from entering critical business processes. This protects against operational risks and ensures that decision-making, reporting and regulatory compliance are based on accurate and trusted information.

The purpose of validations is to:

  • Ensure data quality so that analytics, reporting and decision-making are based on accurate, consistent information.
  • Prevent operational errors by stopping incorrect or incomplete data before it flows into critical processes.
  • Maintain compliance with regulatory requirements, vendor contracts and internal governance policies.
  • Reduce downstream remediation costs by catching issues early rather than fixing them later.

BIQH validation types

Validations are organised into three tiers, separating container checks, content checks and process-level monitoring. The diagram below illustrates this process, using traffic-light indicators to show how data moves through the platform:

  • Green: Validation passed, process continues downstream without interruption.
  • Orange: Passed but flagged, requires human review (for example via the Four-Eyes module).
  • Red: Hard stop. The issue must be resolved, either by your team or by BIQH as part of standard or managed services, before processing can continue.
Validations

Tier 1 File structure validations (container level)

Applied before any content is read, these checks ensure that files are technically sound and match the feed’s expected schema.
Examples:

  • Required headers are present in accordance with the feed specification.
  • File format is supported (File format matches the expected type, such as TXT, XML, CSV, XLSX, JSON or API.
  • In case of multiple files, all expected data is present.

Prevents malformed files from entering the process, ensuring safe downstream parsing. Green, orange and red status indicators determine whether the data advances to Tier 2.

Tier 2 Data content validations (record level)

Applied after the file passes structure checks, these focus on the fields and records themselves.

Validation groupPurposeExample
Format and Data Type ValidationChecks syntax, pattern and typeISIN per ISO 6166; valid currency codes
Completeness and Mandatory Field ChecksEnsures essential attributes are presentPrice and Price Date not null
Allowed Values and Reference Data ValidationConfirms values exist in approved code listsCFI per ISO 10962; valid MIC codes
Range and Threshold ValidationEnsures values stay within realistic limitsPrice change within tolerance
Cross-Field Consistency and Business Logic RulesApplies logical conditions across fieldsIF/ELSE dependencies within a record
Referential Integrity and Cross-Record ChecksPrevents duplicates and enforces unique keysAll position records’ Instrument IDs must exist in the Security Master
Cross-Source Reconciliation ChecksCompares data across providersPrice comparison between vendors
Regulatory and Compliance ValidationsApplies policy-driven rulesNAV not older than two days; Four-Eyes approval

Purpose: Ensures the content itself is correct, complete, consistent and compliant. Orange or red results here can trigger the Four-Eyes review process or escalation to BIQH’s managed services.

Tier 3 Monitoring validations (process level)

Observability controls that track the health, timeliness and delivery of data feeds. They do not assess the correctness of the content but ensure that data arrives and is ready for processing.
Examples:

  • Timeliness checks verifying data arrives by the agreed cut-off time or expected frequency (for example hourly).
  • Operational readiness checks confirming files or API responses are available for ingestion.
  • Exception dashboards surfacing warnings, late arrivals or missing data during collection and validation.

Purpose: Assures operational readiness so that validated data can flow to downstream systems without interruption. Once all validations are green, the data proceeds through the BIQH platform and is delivered to target applications.

Flexible validation creation

With our flexible GUI, we can create any type of validation you require, even if it is not listed above. If there is a specific check you expect but do not see here, let us know and we will configure it for you.

For any other questions, or to explore our capabilities in more detail, please contact us or download our factsheet.

Reach out to us if you have any questions
jan-douwe.ekhart@biqh.com

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