Publication: Framework for multidimensional definition of the data model, structure, taxonomies and rules of the XBRL specification
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2015-12
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2016-02-10
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Abstract
Since 2000 there has been a significant development in the number of applications based on XML and Data Warehouses. As these types of applications need to interact with different technologies and other applications, interoperability is an important factor. In parallel, in the same period there has been an evolution of the economic data needed by companies and financial institutions, increasing the number of entities that need more information, but also requiring this information to be reliable and on time. That economic or financial information is reliable does not refer to encoding or transmission errors, since there were already enough reliable procedures for this in 2000, but that these reports have to be semantically correct. It is in this decade that the need for economists and accountants to obtain their reports with semantic content has been observed. For this reason some specifications for the transmission of economic information have arisen, such as the eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) and the Statistical Data and Metadata eXchange (SDMX). The reports of both specifications have semantic content and are dedicated to sending and processing financial and / or statistical information. However, both specifications were created by expert economists or statisticians, and their only purpose was to solve their problems without formalizing their definitions and conceptual rules, because there is a Conceptual Model and the Logical Model created is very close to the Physical Model, that is to say, to its implementation.
The aim of this thesis is to formalize the specification of economic financial reports using the XBRL specification, analysing and auditing that specification. In addition, the design of these reports is studied in depth by making use of the methodology of the Model Driven Architecture (MDA), with the ultimate goal of analysing its interoperability. Finally, some proofs of concept are shown, with different validations that are the proposal of the thesis.
The thesis begins by analysing the necessity of this specification (XBRL), its historical origin, and the general state of the art that has led to the use of it as a de facto standard. In addition, this research work studies its evolution and utilization, both historically, as it is today, and its expected future.
Once the state of the art of economic financial semantic reports has been analysed, the next step is to analyse the XBRL specification. After giving an overview of the XBRL language or specification, the thesis begins to detail it and finally shows the set of meta-metadata used in XBRL, using UML.
This thesis proposes designing both the metadata of the reports and the reports themselves. This research work also proposes to study the different implementations of these reports and their design in totality. MDA provides a good consolidated framework for automatic code generation in the life cycle of software development, in addition to solving the problems of heterogeneity and interoperability between systems with different platforms.
One of the main challenges of this research is the formalization of the specification in the conceptual model. Different types of design are also discussed, including those already making intensive use of dimensions (European design) and making less use of dimensions (mainly US and Canadian design). This work is mainly based on the reports of the European Supervision - Regulation, thus making intensive use of dimensions. This is due to the fact that the author of this thesis belongs to various groups that deal with harmonised European supervision reports and is a civil servant of the Bank of Spain, and this institution is part of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB), and this in turn through the European Central Bank (ECB) and the European National Central Banks (NCBs) participates in the Eurosystem (monetary Authority in the Eurozone (Eurosystems)). Therefore the conceptual model proposed in this research is the Multidimensional Data Model (MDM). The proposal is based on reports defined for the European Supervision/Regulation. These reports are the data requested of financial institutions or supervised companies, being the Universe of the Discourse (UD), also called the Computation Independent Model (CIM), using the methodology of the MDA.
Once the definitions are fulfilled the next step is analysing the processes of validation of this proposal, showing algorithms for the MDM and the process of generating assertions, or formulas in the XBRL Data Model (XBRLDM) data. In addition, its implementation is displayed in the logical and physical models.
The entire proposal is supported by different Proofs of Concept (POCs) submitted in specialized forums of the European financial and economic supervision. These tests are based on three European taxonomies: Financial Report 2008 (FINREP), 2012
and Solvency II (Eurofiling 2015). FINREP taxonomy is sponsored by the European Banking Authority (EBA). Solvency II codifies and harmonizes the regulation of insurance in the European Union (EU) and is sponsored by the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA). In these POCs all the proposals of this thesis are shown and analysed. In addition, tables show the different tests that show the validation of this proposal at the various levels of the MDA methodology.
In addition, the interoperability of economic financial reports, and their need for mapping XBRL, spreadsheets, Access, Database Management System (DBMS), XML and others are analysed.
Finally, research work that has to be done in the immediate future as a result of this thesis is proposed.
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Keywords
XBRL specification, Multidimensional data model, MDM, Taxonomies, Model Driven Architecture, MDA