ACTUS-Aligned Contract Intelligence for Banks, Regulators & Regenerative Infrastructure

Published by: CIRAS Research Team
Category: Research Program • Banking Innovation • Financial Infrastructure • Contract Intelligence • Public Good Finance
Status: Open for Consortium Partners & Pilot Projects

1) Why CIRAS Starts This Program Now

Across Europe and globally, we are witnessing a paradox:

• The need for capital to build regenerative infrastructure (energy, housing, resilience, circular economy) has never been greater.
• Yet the financial system that should enable this transformation remains slow, expensive, fragmented, and hard to govern.

Most financing structures—whether for public infrastructure, corporate investment, or banking portfolios—depend on something fundamental:

Financial contracts and their lifecycle behavior over time.

Loans, bonds, leases, mortgages, deposits, guarantees, and structured products are not only “documents.”
They are machines of obligation.

They generate events.
They generate cashflows.
They generate risks.
They generate systemic consequences.

However, today’s financial industry still operates those machines with tools designed for an earlier era:

• contract logic fragmented across platforms
• inconsistent data definitions
• duplicated modeling approaches
• reconciliation-based operations
• and reporting systems that require extensive manual labor

This creates a structural bottleneck that affects:

• banks and financial institutions
• regulators and supervisory authorities
• municipalities and public administrations
• infrastructure developers and EPC partners
• investors and capital providers
• citizens who ultimately pay the long-term cost

To address this, CIRAS launches the:

Contract-Centric Public Finance Lab (CCPFL)

A research and applied prototyping program for standardized, simulation-ready contract intelligence

2) The Root Cause: Finance Does Not Speak a Single Machine Language

The financial world has standards for messaging, identifiers, and settlement protocols.

But finance still lacks a shared, enforceable standard for one core element:

Contract logic itself.

Two banks may both hold “mortgages.”
But inside their systems, those mortgages might be represented by:

• different field names
• different assumptions
• different cashflow engines
• different default logic
• different maturity and schedule rules
• different reporting transformations

And even inside one bank, the same contract may be represented three or four different ways—across:

• product systems
• accounting systems
• risk systems
• treasury systems
• data warehouse pipelines
• regulatory reporting stacks

This is why the financial sector spends enormous resources on:

• reconciliation
• remediation
• model disputes
• manual exception handling
• costly “system change programs”
• operational fixes that repeat endlessly

3) The ACTUS Breakthrough: “Finance Speaks One Language”

CIRAS CCPFL is built on the foundations of ACTUS
(Algorithmic Contract Type Unified Standard), a global standard designed to represent financial contracts in an algorithmic, computable form.

ACTUS introduces a powerful concept:

✅ Contracts can be expressed as standardized contract types (taxonomy)
✅ Contracts can be described by a standardized attribute set (data dictionary)
✅ Rules can validate what must exist and what cannot exist (applicability rules)
✅ Rules can enforce logical time consistency (time consistency rules)
✅ Contracts can generate event schedules and expected cashflows (technical specification)
✅ Cashflows can be analytically transformed into key outputs (income, liquidity, value)

ACTUS describes contract intelligence as a sequence:

Risk Factors → Contract Inputs → Contract Events → Expected Cashflows → Analytics Outputs

This single chain—if implemented correctly—creates a “truth spine” that everything else can plug into.

4) Ariadne’s Core Thesis: Redefining the “Core of Core Banking”

CIRAS is also inspired by the practical banking architecture argument presented by Ariadne (SolitX), which states:

Modern core banking systems are often the accidental result of decades of patching.
They have become expensive, fragile, and slow.

Ariadne proposes something simple—but radical:

The true core of banking is the creation, lifecycle management, and trading of financial contracts.

Everything else—KYC/AML, onboarding, channels, document workflow—should be modular services connected via APIs.

This is a highly strategic point, because it means:

• contract logic should be stable
• contract analytics should be universal
• product creation should be configuration-based
• time-to-market must shrink
• costs must collapse

In this worldview, ACTUS becomes essential, because it provides a foundation for describing “the entire range of financial products” as a standardized set of contract types and attributes.

5) What CCPFL Builds: CIRAS Contract Intelligence for Public Good Finance

CCPFL is not a marketing project.
It is a research-to-prototype program that delivers working infrastructure and published methods.

Our goal is to create a contract-centric financial intelligence layer, which can be adopted by banks, institutions, and public authorities to:

• reduce costs
• reduce reconciliation friction
• improve risk and ALM forecasting
• accelerate product development
• strengthen compliance and transparency
• increase public trust in public-interest financing

6) The CCPFL Research Modules (Deep Work Packages)

WP1 — Contract Standardization Layer (Taxonomy + Dictionary + Contract Objects)

The problem:
Most institutions do not share a consistent contract representation.
Even internally, the same instrument can exist in multiple incompatible forms.

The solution:
CIRAS will implement the CIRAS Contract Object Model (CCOM) aligned to ACTUS.

This includes:

WP1.1 ACTUS Taxonomy Integration

We adopt ACTUS contract types as the core classification system for instruments.

This creates a standardized mapping:

Real-world product → Contract Type → Required Attributes → Event Logic

WP1.2 ACTUS Data Dictionary Alignment

We use the dictionary approach to define a universal “contract schema.”

CIRAS extends it with:

• public-interest disclosure flags
• provenance metadata
• audit-grade versioning support

WP1.3 Applicability Rule Engine

ACTUS defines attribute applicability rules:

• mandatory / optional / non-applicable
• conditional rules
• parent-child contract context
• array consistency rules

CIRAS will implement these rules as a validation module that prevents contract objects from becoming inconsistent or incomplete.

Deliverables

• CCOM v1 (contract schema)
• Taxonomy mapping guide
• Validation + applicability rules engine

WP2 — Contract Integrity & Time Consistency

The problem:
Many finance models break not because of “bad math” but because of bad timelines:

• inconsistent dates
• missing maturity logic
• wrong event ordering
• amendments that aren’t traceable

The solution:
ACTUS provides time consistency rules that constrain contract timestamp ordering.

CIRAS will build:

• contract time consistency validator
• lifecycle state machine
• amendment tracking and audit trails

Deliverables

• time consistency module
• lifecycle governance framework
• amendment audit protocol

WP3 — Event Generation & Cashflow Engine (“Contracts Become Executable”)

This work package turns contracts into computable instruments.

The ACTUS technical specification defines how:

Contract Terms → Contract Events → Expected Cashflows

This means every contract type has predictable event logic.

CIRAS will implement an engine that can:

• generate contractual obligation schedules
• project cashflows forward
• reconcile expected cashflows with observed settlement history
• produce explainable outputs

Deliverables

• contract event engine prototype
• cashflow projection library
• reconciliation and deviation reporting

WP4 — Analytics Outputs: Income, Liquidity, Value (ALM-grade)

Once contract events and cashflows are consistent, analytics becomes dramatically simpler.

CIRAS builds:

• income forecasting and P&L projections
• liquidity timing analysis
• valuation and scenario sensitivity tools
• stress testing packs (macro + project + policy)

This enables a unified framework for:

• treasury
• risk
• finance
• regulatory reporting

Deliverables

• analytics output library
• risk scenario packs
• explainability layer for decision makers

WP5 — Integration into Banking & Legacy Systems (Contract-Centric Core Blueprint)

This work package is where theory becomes deployment-ready.

We implement an integration architecture consistent with Ariadne’s principle:

✅ core focuses on contracts
✅ external services connect via APIs
✅ data mapping reduces reconciliation
✅ new product creation is configuration-based

CIRAS will deliver a migration playbook:

• how to map legacy exports into contract objects
• how to validate them automatically
• how to generate events, cashflows, and analytics
• how to feed regulatory reporting outputs consistently

Deliverables

• reference architecture blueprint
• legacy-to-contract mapping playbook
• API spec + integration adapters

WP6 — Transparency, Governance & Compliance-by-Design

ACTUS explicitly highlights benefits for regulators and supervised institutions:

• ongoing remote data collection
• near-time analysis of systemic risk
• consolidation across institutions
• reduced need for onsite supervision
• lower cost and complexity of reporting

CIRAS will operationalize this by producing:

• audit-ready disclosure templates
• evidence-linked reporting outputs
• role-based governance and approval logic
• public-interest transparency factsheets (where applicable)

Deliverables

• disclosure standard v1
• reporting export packages
• oversight dashboard prototypes

WP7 — Pilot Implementations (Proof through Real Projects)

CCPFL includes two pilots:

Pilot A — Community Energy / Renewable Infrastructure

For example:

• PV financing
• microgrid investment models
• performance-linked repayment structures

Pilot B — Municipal Resilience Infrastructure

For example:

• resilient water systems
• critical grid upgrades
• circular infrastructure financing

Each pilot will test:

• data mapping
• contract integrity validation
• scenario simulation
• governance and audit outputs
• stakeholder transparency mechanisms

Deliverables

• 2 pilot implementations
• evaluation report
• scaling roadmap

7) Why Banks Save Massive Cost by Using CCPFL + ACTUS Results

This section is critical for decision-makers and sponsors.

The financial industry today suffers from “parallel realities” of the same contract.

Every time a bank represents the same contract differently across systems, it creates:

• duplicated implementation cost
• reconciliation labor
• mismatched reporting outputs
• model disputes
• regulatory remediation expense
• operational incidents and outages
• slower product innovation

A contract-centric standard collapses these costs.

7.1 Savings Driver #1 — Eliminating duplicated engines

Without standards, every product line requires:

• separate cashflow logic
• separate lifecycle rules
• separate reporting transformations

With ACTUS-aligned contract intelligence:

✅ one contract model drives all systems
✅ one cashflow engine drives all forecasts
✅ one validation set prevents errors early

Bank outcome: fewer systems, fewer conflicting models, less maintenance.

7.2 Savings Driver #2 — Reduced reconciliation operations

Reconciliation is one of the largest hidden costs in banking.

ACTUS reduces reconciliation because:

• contract objects are standardized
• attributes are validated (mandatory vs optional)
• timestamps are consistent
• events/cashflows are generated from rules

So instead of “finding mismatches after the fact,” the system prevents inconsistencies at the moment of contract ingestion.

Bank outcome: less manual repair, fewer breaks, fewer exceptions.

7.3 Savings Driver #3 — Faster product creation (weeks/days instead of months)

Ariadne’s argument is blunt:

Legacy core banking makes product innovation slow and expensive, while a contract-centric core makes products “configuration-driven.”

ACTUS strengthens this by giving:

• reusable contract type templates
• a standardized attribute framework
• consistent event generation logic

Bank outcome: new products can be launched faster with less risk.

7.4 Savings Driver #4 — Cleaner and cheaper regulatory reporting

Regulatory reporting often requires:

• repeated transformations
• repeated reconciliations
• reporting corrections
• audit remediation cycles

ACTUS provides a path toward:

• consistent, structured data
• standardized outputs
• easier consolidation across institutions

Bank outcome: lower compliance burden and faster supervisory response.

7.5 Savings Driver #5 — Better ALM + liquidity forecasting

When contract cashflows are consistent and explainable, treasury gets:

• better liquidity timing
• better stress test reliability
• better balance sheet optimization

Bank outcome: fewer liquidity surprises, better funding decisions, lower systemic risk.

8) The Strategic Result: Banks Become “Contract-Native”

CIRAS believes banks will increasingly compete on their ability to be:

✅ contract-native
✅ simulation-ready
✅ explainable and transparent
✅ API-integrated
✅ resilient against regulatory and market shocks

Just like modern software companies evolved from “manual IT” to standardized frameworks, banks can evolve from “manual reconciliation finance” to contract intelligence finance.

9) Consortium Invitation: Join CCPFL

CIRAS invites consortium partners in the following roles:

Banking Partners

• retail banks
• corporate banks
• leasing institutions
• treasury and ALM groups

Public Sector Partners

• municipalities
• ministries
• infrastructure agencies
• public procurement bodies

Technology Partners

• core banking and integration vendors
• regtech and suptech builders
• data engineering teams
• digital identity and governance platforms

Academic and Research Partners

• quantitative finance groups
• applied systems engineering labs
• public finance researchers

10) How to Participate

CIRAS is currently opening three tracks:

1. Pilot Track (real contracts and real data)
2. Standardization Track (taxonomy + dictionary + validation rules)
3. Prototype Track (event engine + analytics + dashboards)

📩 Contact: info@ciras.org
Subject: CCPFL – Consortium / Pilot / Partnership

Closing Statement

The future of finance depends on whether we can make obligations:

• computable
• comparable
• auditable
• transparent
• simulation-ready

CCPFL is CIRAS’ contribution to building that missing infrastructure—one that reduces costs for banks, improves oversight for regulators, and strengthens trust in public-interest financing.

Finance must speak one language. CCPFL makes it real.