Agents are asking now
ICE's fixed income data now reaches licensed users inside AI assistants, with user permissioning. Each request comes from an agent acting for a person. The record should say both.
Entitlements · Four cases. Pick one. Sound on.
Every entitlement decision gets a receipt. ICE and the customer both hold it.
All four customers are fictional. People and AI agents get the same kind of receipt.
1 of 7
An AI assistant asks ICE for data, for a named analyst.
Why entitlements, why now
Every request for ICE data ends in a yes or a no. Today each side keeps its own record of it.
When a customer questions an invoice, a license review asks who pulled what, or an AI agent asks on someone's behalf, both sides go back to their own logs. The customer can't check yours, and you can't check theirs.
Value pricing needs a shared count
ICE says users should "pay for the value of the data delivered, rather than the volume of compute consumed." That works best when the customer holds the same record of what was allowed and delivered.
Agents go off task
This year a major AI developer disclosed agents acting "beyond their assigned tasks," including using developer keys found online. Months later it is still working out the full scope. A receipt per request makes that a same-day question.
Try it yourself
Change the receipt. Watch it stop matching.
This is the receipt Wrenfield holds for one entitlement decision. The fingerprint was taken when it was sealed. Change who it was for, the dataset or the decision, and your browser recomputes it on the spot. Nothing is sent anywhere.
ENTITLEMENT RECEIPTExample · not ICE data
- Receipt
- ENT-2026.09.29-0412
- Requester
- AI assistant (agent)
- License
- WF-2291 v4
- Time
- 14:02:11 ET
Sealed fingerprint
...Fingerprint now
...MATCHESThis is the receipt as it was sealed.
SHA-256 over the receipt fields, computed by your browser with the Web Crypto API.
Why a third party
A log you keep is your word. A receipt from a third party is something both sides can check.
Your logs are good. The customer's may be good too. When they disagree, each side is asking the other to trust a record it controls. Hive has no stake in the count, the license or the bill. It writes the receipt from a copy of your decision, and ICE and the customer hold the same one.
The same dispute, three ways
Wrenfield's controller questions the September invoice. ICE billed 1,240 allowed requests for EOD evaluations. Wrenfield's own log shows 1,180. What does each side have to work with?
- Who has to trust whom
- Who can check it
- Time to settle
Example. Wrenfield is fictional and the counts are made up to show the point.
Disputes start from agreement
An invoice question or a license review starts from a receipt both sides already hold. The argument is about what it means, not whose log to believe.
Audits go both ways
ICE's agreement has subscribers keep access records for 36 months and lets ICE audit them. When the record is a receipt the subscriber already holds and can check, the audit starts from something neither side made up alone.
Evidence for the customer's auditors
Funds that use pricing services have to oversee them under SEC Rule 2a-5. A record the fund can check without asking ICE is something it can hand to its own board and auditors.
Nothing for your developers to own
Hive runs the receipt service outside ICE. There's no new system to maintain, no code in the access path and no key to manage to start. Your product team runs the test. If a daily export of decisions already exists, the test starts from that file.
When the record is the argument
These aren't stories about bad actors. They're about records that weren't shared, weren't right, or couldn't show when.
Well-run firms end up here. A receipt wouldn't have prevented any of these. It would have made each question faster to answer, from a record both sides already held.
- 2018 to 2020Bloomberg v. UBS
Bloomberg licensed data to UBS for use inside UBS Delta, a risk tool for UBS clients. An audit under the license found clients could view and pull out Bloomberg data from the tool. The case ran two years before an undisclosed settlement.
It came down to: what was used, by whom, under which license.
Receipts show that per request, as it happens, on both sides' copies.
S.D.N.Y. opinion, Dec 2018 · A-Team Insight on the settlement
- 2024Citadel Securities
FINRA fined Citadel Securities $1 million for inaccurately reporting about 42.2 billion order events to the Consolidated Audit Trail from 2020 to 2022, across 33 error types, and reporting about 580 million late.
It came down to: a log that was wrong at scale for years.
When the other side checks the same record every day, drift shows up in days.
- 2021 to nowThe SEC's recordkeeping sweep
More than 100 firms and more than $2 billion in penalties, for records the firms admitted they were required to keep and didn't. In August 2024 alone, 26 firms paid $392.75 million.
It came down to: the record wasn't there.
A receipt that exists on both sides can't quietly go missing from one.
Summaries of public orders and court filings. Settled matters were resolved without admitting or denying the findings unless the order says otherwise.
Who keeps Hive honest?
- Both sides hold every receipt. If Hive changed one, both copies would show it.
- The check runs without Hive. In a browser or offline, against a published key.
- Hive is paid for the service. So it isn't independent of the contract. It has no stake in the count, the license or the bill, and it never decides entitlement.
- ICE can add its own signature at any time. It isn't needed to start.
In this demo, Hive's demo key signs the examples, so the examples themselves are not independent.
Agents on the job
Two checks on every agent request: the license, and the job it was approved for.
A license says what a customer may receive. It doesn't say what one agent was supposed to be doing. The receipt records both, so an agent that wanders off shows up the same day. Pick a request and see what lands on the record.
APPROVED JOBKestrel Ridge · fictional
- Agent
- Valuation assistant
- Acting for
- M. Osei, Kestrel Ridge
- Job
- Fund A evaluations
- Instruments
- 312 bonds
- When
- Evenings, 18:00 to 22:00 ET
- License
- KR-3307 v2: EOD evaluations
Pick a request
License check...
Job check...
ON THE RECORD...
Hive doesn't block anything. ICE's entitlement system makes the license decision. The job check produces a flag for a person. In the test, both sides agree which flags go to whom.
What it answers for ICE
The entitlement questions that cost time today, answered from one receipt.
License review
"Who pulled this, and were they allowed?"
Each receipt names the requester, who it was for, the license and version, and the decision, in order.
Billing and metering
"Why does the invoice say 1,240?"
Allowed and denied requests are counted by license version. Both sides reconcile from the same receipts. People decide what gets billed.
Agent access
"Which agent, for whom, doing what?"
Every agent request carries the agent, the named user and the approved job. Anything outside the job is flagged that day.
Customer disputes
"Why were we blocked?"
A denial shows what was asked, which rule said no and that nothing was sent. The customer checks it on their own copy.
The analyst's audit file
ICE already promises the analyst a PDF for the audit file. Here it is, and it can be checked.
ICE's July report says the AI agent returns the answer in line, "with a downloadable PDF artifact for the analyst's audit file." This example is that PDF. Each sentence with an ICE number is tied to the ICE value behind it, the model's own words are marked as the model's, and the signed record is attached inside the file. Scan the QR code, or check it offline with no Hive account.
ICE Fixed Income Monthly Report, July 2026 · Example with synthetic values, signed with the Hive demo key. Not an ICE document.
How it plugs in
Your entitlement system stays exactly as it is. Hive reads a copy of its decisions.
- 1ICE decides
The entitlement system allows or denies, as it does today. Nothing in the access path changes.
- 2A copy of the decision
A daily export you may already have, or a read-only feed for one agreed path. No code in the access path.
- 3Hive writes the receipt
Fingerprints each decision, chains them in order and signs the chain. No data content, only fingerprints.
- 4Both sides hold it
ICE keeps a copy. The customer keeps a copy. Authorized people check it on their own machine, offline.
WHAT'S ON AN ENTITLEMENT RECEIPTAgreed on Day 1
| Field | Example | Why it's there |
|---|---|---|
| Requester | Person, or an agent with its own ID | Tells a person from an agent |
| On behalf of | D. Reyes, Wrenfield | Every agent request ties to a named user |
| Approved job | Fund A evaluations, 312 bonds | Lets the job check flag an agent that wanders off |
| Dataset | EOD evaluations | What was asked for |
| License and version | WF-2291 v4 | Which terms the decision was checked against |
| Decision and rule | Allowed, or denied: not in license | Denials count as much as approvals |
| Time | 14:02:11 ET | Puts every decision in order |
| Response fingerprint | c368...ea14 | Proves what went out without holding it |
Never on the receipt: the data itself, prices, positions or anything ICE marks restricted.
The whole arc
Every handoff in a request gets a receipt, from the quote to the answer.
On the MCP connector, one request passes through four moments: the quote, the decision, the delivery and the answer. Each one gets its own receipt on the same chain, in order, so ICE and the customer can follow a single request end to end. Three of the four are already shown on this site. The quote depends on one thing to confirm with your team on Day 1.
- 1The quote
Before the query runs, the connector quotes a price. If that quote is an event Hive can read, its receipt holds a fingerprint of the quote, with the dataset, the license and the time. Never the price itself. To confirm on Day 1.
- 2The decision
Allowed or denied, with the rule and the license version. This is the entitlement receipt on this page.
- 3The delivery
Each send and acknowledgement gets a receipt with a fingerprint of what went out, as in the data delivery cases. A resend shows as a resend. Hive never holds the data.
- 4The answer
The analyst's audit file shown above. Each ICE sentence is tied to the ICE value behind it, and the model's own words are marked as the model's.
Hive reads a copy of each moment after it happens and stays out of the access path at every step. The quote matters most for value pricing, because that's where the count starts. The receipt shows the count. What it's billed at stays between ICE and the customer.
Who does what
ICE decides. Hive keeps the receipt, as the third party. People act on it.
ICEMakes every decision
Runs the entitlement system, sets licenses, allows or denies each request and decides billing. None of that changes.
HIVEKeeps the receipt
Reads each decision after ICE makes it, fingerprints it, chains it in order and signs the chain. Raises the job-check flags that both sides agreed on.
PEOPLEAct on it
An approved ICE or customer reviewer reads the receipt and decides what it means. Hive shows what happened. It never rules on it.
- Hive never decides or enforces entitlement
- Hive never blocks, delivers or slows data
- Hive never holds the data, only fingerprints
- If Hive is down, access works exactly as today
- Hive never watches what customers do with data after delivery
- Counts on the receipt are not an agreed billing quantity
Straight answers
The questions an entitlement owner will ask.
We already log every entitlement decision. Why this?
Keep your logs. They stay the system of record. The difference is that the customer holds the same receipt and can check it without asking ICE, and neither side can quietly change it later.
Honestly, we could build this. Why wouldn't we?
Yes, you could build it. It would still be your log. However good it is, in a dispute or an exam the customer can still ask how they know it wasn't changed. A copy they already hold, and can check without asking ICE or Hive, answers that before anyone asks. That shared copy is what Hive adds. The rest is engineering you already have.
Does Hive sit in the access path?
No. Hive reads a copy of decision events after ICE makes them. If Hive goes down, requests are allowed or denied exactly as today. The receipts show the gap instead of hiding it.
What do you need from our entitlement system?
For one agreed path, a read-only feed of decision events: requester, on behalf of, dataset, license and version, decision, rule and time. If the quote and delivery events are readable on that path, those too. Never the data itself.
How do you know it's an agent, and who it's acting for?
The same way your entitlement system does today: from the credentials and user permissioning on the request. The receipt records what ICE's system saw. If a request arrives with no named user, that shows on the receipt too.
Can Hive stop an agent that goes off task?
Hive doesn't block anything. It flags requests that fall outside the approved job, the same day, to the people both sides name. Whether a flag should lead ICE's own systems to hold access is a decision for ICE, and something we can scope in the test.
Who holds the keys?
In the test, Hive signs as the third party, with a production key that neither ICE nor the customer holds. ICE can add its own signature and the customer can countersign, but neither is needed to start. In this demo, Hive runs a demo key, so the examples are not independently signed.
Do our developers need to be involved?
Very little. Hive runs the receipt service, so there is nothing new for ICE to build or maintain, and nothing in the access path. If a daily export of entitlement decisions already exists, the test starts from that file. If not, a read-only feed is one to two engineering days, by our estimate.
What does the customer see?
Only receipts for their own requests. Other customers, license terms beyond their own and ICE's internal fields stay out.
Can we stop?
Any time, either side. If ICE asks, Hive deletes its copy within 30 days and confirms in writing. The copies ICE and the customer hold stay theirs.
When the copies disagree, what happens?
Both sides see it the same day. The receipts show which ones don't match, in which time window and in which fields. The owners each side named sort it out from the record, and Hive never decides who's right. Days 61 to 80 test this on purpose, with an altered copy among the planned breaks.
The proposal
Test it on one entitlement path for 90 days.*
You pick one entitlement path. Our suggestion: requests that come through the AI platform connection, the MCP connector. It's the newest channel, and it's where ICE's value pricing applies. Add one customer who's willing to take part and one owner at ICE. Hive stays outside the access path the whole time.
Days 1 to 14Set up beside itAgree the path, which of the four moments it covers, the fields and the job checks. Hive starts reading a read-only copy of decision events.
Days 15 to 60Let receipts build upEvery decision lands on the record. A short report goes out every Friday: allowed, denied and flagged.
Days 61 to 80Try to break itPlanned tests: a license change mid-day, a request with no named user, an agent sent off task, an altered copy.
Days 81 to 90You pick the requestsICE picks real requests. Can ICE and the customer both show what was allowed, under which license, and why? Then ICE decides go, change or stop.
What ICE walks away with
- Coverage report
- Allowed, denied and flagged counts by license version
- Real agent examples
- A customer-facing receipt prototype
- What production would need
- A clear go, change or stop
ICE's time: a one-hour kickoff, then about an hour a week. Engineering: none if a daily decision export already exists, otherwise one to two days for a read-only feed. Our estimate, confirmed on Day 1.
* The 90-day test is offered for entitlements only, the first focus ICE named. Nothing has been agreed. For other ICE surfaces, see other options.