Contracts: Digitised vs. Digital

Market data contracts are essential for data publishers (Exchanges, inter-dealer brokers, data aggregators, or redistributors) and subscribers (investment banks, asset management funds, etc.), despite widely acknowledged challenges like “poor culture of contractual provisions” and fragmented supervision⁴. Many organisations still rely on digitised contracts – static PDFs or scanned, paper-based documents without automation or intelligence. This is a fundamental difference between “digitised contracts” and “digital contracts”: 

Ultimately, a digitised contract (or electronic contract/ e-contract) is merely a scanned or electronically created document contract modelled, specified, executed, and deployed by a software system⁵. However, digital contracts aren’t just electronic, they include digital features, like smart-code-based interactive agreements that enforce terms automatically and integrate with financial systems wherever the data goes, as highlighted in a recent video [01:45].

SOURCE: PROCUREMENT TACTICS (2025)

Game-Changing Difference

Unlike digitised contracts, digital contracts are code-based and stored in a centralised location where they are organised and structured living assets. Powered by Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT), digital contracts are a global standard, frequently recognised as the most secure, transparent, and efficient way to store, access, control, and track contractual data⁶. In industries where trust, compliance, and traceability are crucial, DLT-based contracts provide a secure and transparent solution. These digital contracts are tamper-proof and easily verified, reducing inefficiencies and the risk of fraud.  
 
DLT-based digital contracts are already widely used in industries that impact people’s daily lives, ensuring trust, safety, and accountability in critical supply chains: 

• Pharmaceuticals – Drug development, distribution, and safety have long relied on DLT-powered traceability⁷. DLT-based digital contracts ensure regulatory compliance, prevent theft, and, most importantly, improve recall efficiency—ensuring that life-saving drugs meet strict safety standards. 
• Food & Agriculture – Organisations like IBM Food Trust⁸ use DLT to track and verify the entire lifecycle of food products, from farm to table. With blockchain-powered contracts, every step in the supply chain is transparent, auditable, and secure, ensuring that consumers can trust where their food comes from. This continually saves lives, reducing the time it takes to trace the source of contamination from days to seconds⁹.

Solving Market Data Challenges 

In addition to a complex market climate, like rising market data prices¹⁰, traditional contract management relies on static agreements that require manual oversight. This leads to multiple challenges for market data managers¹¹ like inefficiencies, increased compliance risks and revenue loss. Lacking automation, firms struggle to track contract expirations, enforce terms, and ensure data usage aligns with agreements.  

Leveraging digital contract management solutions has been shown to increase compliance by 55%¹² and DRDM solves market data challenges by enabling: 

1. Instant Search and retrieval of expiring contracts 
2. Automated contract updates and bulk changes, ensuring consistency 
3. Track usage to prevent discrepancies and enforce licensing terms. 
4. Automation of periodic price adjustments, reducing manual intervention to ensure revenue growth. 
5. Track sent contracts in real-time, with automated reminders for signatures. 
6. Seamless online negotiations, reducing time-to-execution. 
7. Maintain a full audit trail, ensuring contracts are compliant and enforceable. 
8. Link contracts with Automated Declarations, ensuring market data usage aligns with contractual rights. 

SOURCE: PROCUREMENT TACTICS (2025)

Increasing Efficiency and Lowering Costs

Without structured and automated digital contract systems organisations waste valuable time and resources on manual contract reviews, compliance checks, and dispute resolution. DRDM’s Digital Contract Network (DCN) eliminates these inefficiencies by delivering: 

• Real-time tracking through the immutable DLT-powered DCN. 
• Automated compliance and visibility to ensure contracts are aligned with regulations like MiFIR. 
• Seamless contract enforcement and reporting through permissioning systems like EMRS, DACS, etc.  
• AI-powered contract searches to proactively manage market intelligence, identifying the overutilisation of digital rights. 
• Contract integration with workflow automation to reduce spending on manual processes like onboarding, KYC, and entitlement tracking. 
• Eliminate resource-heavy contract administration instantly accessible agreements via DRDM’s user-friendly front-end software. 

Firms must move beyond outdated, static agreements and embrace digitally intelligent contracts that ensure compliance, automation, and security. DRDM’s digital contracts transform contract management into a dynamic and proactive process that reduces incompliant risks and inefficiencies while ensuring every agreement is enforceable, verifiable, and future-proofed. 

By leveraging DLT-powered digital contracts, financial organisations that depend on traceability and transparency can confidently manage agreements with unparalleled efficiency and security. DRDM is redefining how market data agreements are managed—offering a smarter, more automated, and regulation-ready future.