Wells Fargo and S1 Team Up to Offer Banks New Private Labeled Online Foreign Exchange Service

Business Wire, Nov 4, 2004

SAN FRANCISCO -- Banks - Regardless of Size - Gain Ability to Offer a Full Range of Foreign Currency Payment Services to Business Customers Under Their Own Brand

Wells Fargo & Company (NYSE: WFC), today announced that it has entered into an agreement with S1 Corporation (NASDAQ:SONE) to introduce a new online foreign exchange service that will give financial institutions of all sizes the ability to meet the international banking needs of their business customers. The new service will allow banks to provide a full range of easy-to-use foreign exchange services under the bank's own brand name, providing a seamless user experience to the bank's customers.

This service is an extension of Wells Fargo's existing Foreign Exchange Online application, a comprehensive, real-time foreign exchange delivery system that can support a bank's foreign payment transaction and information needs via the Internet. Wells Fargo's Foreign Exchange Online service provides banks with access to buy or sell a wide range of currencies on both a spot and forward basis, print drafts locally, and offers flexible reporting as well as straight-through processing.

This new foreign exchange service gives banks that do not have the infrastructure to support the international needs of business clients a direct connection to the feature-rich foreign exchange trade execution capabilities of Wells Fargo. S1 has developed an online interface that enables businesses to initiate foreign exchange transactions right from their own PCs, dramatically reducing the costs associated with providing this type of service. The new service is delivered as a module that is fully integrated with S1 Business Banking on the S1 Enterprise Platform, and is made possible by a connection to Wells Fargo's new state-of-the-art WellsXchange(TM) web service.

The service is unique because it will provide final payment settlement to foreign beneficiaries in addition to foreign exchange liquidity in a wide range of currencies. Wells Fargo will provide real-time exchange rates, manage trade execution, and initiate settlement instructions on behalf of its correspondent bank customers, who in turn, provide FX services to their business customers. Although Wells Fargo will handle all aspects of payment execution, the service itself will appear under the brand name of the correspondent bank using this new FX service module within S1 Business Banking. This gives banks their own online FX service offering, including the associated incremental revenue, without the complexity of managing the back-end operations required to effectively process foreign transactions.

Empowered by Wells Fargo and S1, banks can enable their business customers to:

--Initiate foreign exchange transactions through a single online solution, without phone calls or waiting for confirmations;

--Significantly reduce or eliminate the need for manual entries of FX transactions;

--Accelerate, via straight-through processing and real-time access, their ability to complete foreign currency payments; and

--Access reports that provide users detailed data on existing and pending transactions at-a-glance.

"With continued growth in international trade, banks are finding that they must offer a full range of international capabilities in order to remain competitive," said Gregg Napoli, senior vice president, Wells Fargo Foreign Exchange Services. "This is a winning solution for banks to meet their customers' needs and generate revenue, because they can leverage Wells Fargo's existing foreign exchange trading and payment execution infrastructure, as well as benefit from the convenience and efficiency of having a foreign exchange module seamlessly integrated with the S1 Business Banking application."

Free trade agreements, such as NAFTA and the introduction of the euro (the common currency of 13 European nations), are making it possible for a greater number of small businesses to expand internationally. Due to the market risks and costs associated with maintaining a foreign exchange operation, many banks have chosen not to offer international banking services and have had to either turn customers away due to the bank's lack of infrastructure or had to default to only offering US dollar denominated payment services. With this new capability, financial institutions of all sizes will be able to capitalize on this high-growth market segment and compete more effectively in today's global economy.

"By partnering with Wells Fargo, a recognized leader in foreign exchange services, to develop this next-generation online foreign exchange service, we can enable our customers to extend their services to new markets that lead to greater revenue opportunities," said Jaime Ellertson, chief executive officer for S1 Corporation. "This is yet another important step in S1's continuous efforts to deliver rich front-end applications that help our banking clients grow revenue and improve customer loyalty."

S1 works with financial institutions of all sizes, from community banks to the top banks in the country. S1's agreement with Wells Fargo demonstrates the organization's ability to understand the needs of financial service providers of all types and sizes and their customers, while deploying solutions that meet the unique requirements of each market segment.