(5)Straight-through processing (‘STP’) should be encouraged, since market-wide use of STP is essential both for maintaining high settlement rates as volumes increase and for ensuring timely settlement of cross-border trades. Moreover, both direct and indirect market participants should have the internal automation in place that is necessary to take full advantage of the available STP solutions. In this respect, investment firms should offer their professional clients the possibility of sending confirmations and allocation details electronically, in particular by using international open communication procedures and standards for messaging and reference data. Furthermore, CSDs should facilitate STP and, when processing settlement instructions, should use processes designed to work on an automated basis by default.