​AI translation for Company Financial Reports

Dual listed companies raising funds in more than one stock exchange often times find it necessary to translate and provide investors with financial reports in more than one language. It is also sometimes typical for companies in non-English speaking companies to translate their financials into English to better reach global investors.

Stock exchanges have language requirements for the companies they list. For example the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEX) has historically required all public company documents to be provided in English and Chinese. In early 2020, Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) also recently required listed companies with paid-in capital of NT$10 billion to NT$15 billion and firms that are more than 30 percent held by foreign investors to publish informational materials in both languages from 2021. The Euronext and Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) require reports in one of their support languages, either French, Dutch, Portuguese or English for the Euronext and English, French, or both for the TSX.

The documents and paperwork required to list and maintain a listed company are considerable. The job of translating and typesetting these documents are usually serviced by financial printers, an industry specializing on this particular task. They usually work in conjunction with investment banks helping companies list or with the listed companies themselves to maintain language proficiency for their quarterly or annual financial reports.

Let's discuss some the key differences when translating company financial reports and how AI translation tools can benefit:

Large & Consistent Volumes but Seasonal

One of the biggest advantages of translating financial reports are the large volumes of consistent work that can be expected each year. This steady amount of work is great news for translation service providers but also problematic because it is seasonal and all the workload arrives within the same timeframe during company reporting (earnings) season. AI translation tools can help translation teams become more efficient and productive so they are more prepared to complete sudden large inflows of work.

Professional Translator Turnover

The pressure put on translation teams to translate financial reports is nothing but demanding. As mentioned, the large and sudden earnings seasons workload don't provide translation teams much breathing room when it is time to perform. Adding to the fact many of these professional translators are skilled and experienced in finance also make them expensive to hire and manage. AI translation software help alleviate some of these human resource issues because it is simply just software. Software doesn't need to be paid overtime, don't get sick, and never complain. They help make financial printers much less of a headache to manage. Due to the above concerns, nearly all of the the financial printers I've come across outsource some portion of their translation work to help them better tackle problems arising from sudden excess translation workloads.

Repetition in Financial Reports

A significant amount of repetition can be found in financial reports. Large sections of the reports are similar between each year of reporting or between companies. Much of these texts are financial legalese that is often structured and specific. Translating this repetitive text is best performed using AI translation tools such as translation memory as it can easily reduce the time and effort required to translate texts previously translated.

Document Sensitivity

The sensitivity of financial reports being translated is very important. Much like translating equity research reports, the confidential documents cannot be tampered with or leaked to the public. Due to workload issues addressed above, this provides additional risk and problems to financial printers who often times need to offload part of their work to other third party translation agencies or printers. AI translation tools shortcut such concerns and help financial printers keep their client's documents within their organization.

Distinct Brand Tone and Voice

Many AI machine translation software have trouble keeping consistency in terms, names, and particular brand writing styles. While I can't vouch for other translation tools in the market, at TranslateFX we developed our software specifically for specific financial documents and contexts such as translating company financial reports. This allows translation teams using our software to adjust their translations according to specific glossaries and translation memory specific to the company reports they are translating. It is another reason why AI translation software can help financial reports, especially when specialized for the documents at hand.