BST Awards 2025: Best buy-side compliance product (trading)—Bloomberg

Overview

Tightly integrated with the wealth of Bloomberg data and the firm’s buy-side portfolio, order and post-trade management systems, Bloomberg’s trade compliance platform, Compliance Manager (CMGR), consists of a rules engine, an exception blotter (Violation Manager, or VMGR) and a suite of reporting tools. The platform’s mission is to facilitate timely trade compliance, including adherence to regulatory guidelines, client mandates and mitigating operational risks.

The solution  

Over 750 pre-coded rule templates provide a starting point for diverse and complex ex-ante and post-trade checks throughout the investment lifecycle. The high degree of customization within the templates coupled with support for custom data extends CMGR’s capabilities to cover clients’ bespoke needs. CMGR features a pre-violation management workflow that includes “split and send” and electronic approval capabilities, which typically streamlines trade compliance for the front office, while a real-time exception management and surveillance blotter supports compliance operations.

Secret sauce  

CMGR leverages the wealth of Bloomberg data to satisfy various compliance requirements. Its ability to provide on-demand compliance snapshots as well as ex-ante evaluations helps distinguish it from its competitors. Being part of Bloomberg Asset and Investment Manager (AIM), the firm’s buy-side order management system (OMS), it covers the entire investment lifecycle and connects to modules from risk to reporting. A range of AI models further enhances its usability and decreases total cost of ownership.

Recent milestones

Building on the popularity of split and send capabilities for held orders, CMGR extended support for this pre-trade compliance feature to bulk order creation workflows such as portfolio rebalancing. CMGR has also achieved a number of performance gains and enhanced violation transparency, in particular within the routing automation workflow. Integration of custom position valuations and rollup-enabled data points into rules has enhanced CMGR’s toolkit, while the application of GenAI for template autofill has bolstered its usability.

Future objectives

In response to heightened market volatility, Bloomberg plans to fortify its logic for detecting cross and wash trades and to bolster its derivative valuation capabilities. Coupled with integration of additional risk analytics, these investments will further CMGR’s effectiveness when managing risk and compliance functions. Bloomberg’s commitment to innovation will drive investment in APIs, unlocking further applications of AI and external integrations.

Why they won

Few WatersTechnology readers will be surprised by seeing Bloomberg’s name in the winners’ circle of yet another awards, given that the New York-headquartered tech and data giant has won more categories in WatersTechnology’s awards over the past 20 years than any other vendor. What is noteworthy, however, is that this is the firm’s third consecutive success in this category, underlining its consistency and phenomenal reach and versatility across a range of disciplines and business processes.

Bloomberg’s win comes courtesy of its CMGR offering that features impressive integration, intelligence and innovation in the trade compliance realm. As a native component of AIM, the firm’s buy-side OMS, CMGR delivers seamless coverage across the full investment lifecycle from pre-trade checks to post-trade surveillance. Its more than 750 customizable rule templates, combined with access to all of Bloomberg’s data, allows buy-side firms to manage complex regulatory and client mandates with confidence, accuracy and transparency. 

CMGR’s “split and send” workflow and electronic approval functions help to optimize front-office efficiency, while its real-time violation management tools strengthen operational oversight. Recent advancements, including GenAI-driven template autofill, expanded bulk order compliance and enhanced transparency, underscore the firm’s commitment to usability and performance. By integrating AI, risk analytics, and open APIs, CMGR continues to push the boundaries of compliance efficiency and intelligence, offering a future-ready, data-rich platform that transforms compliance from a regulatory necessity into a strategic advantage.