Money Management Systems Moves Into Forex Software With IMEX II System

Money Management Systems Inc. of Waltham, Mass. has introduced a foreign exchange trade processing system known as the International Monetary Exchange System. IMEX II represents MMS' first venture into the foreign exchange market. Its MoneyMarket II system for fixed-income securities has been licensed by Security Pacific National Bank, Bank of Boston and Marine Midland Bank N.A.

A privately held company, MMS is a cooperative marketing partner of Digital Equipment Corp. Both IMEX II and MoneyMarket II run on DEC VAX computers.

Jay Goldberg, president of MMS, says the introduction of IMEX II moves the company closer to its goal of becoming "a major, multi- faceted service organization within the financial community."

MMS now has systems for the fixed-income and foreign exchange markets and has been talking with Investment Support Systems Inc. of Bloomfield, N.J. about possible cooperation between the two companies. ISS offers position-keeping and risk management software for futures, options, forwards and swaps that runs on an IBM PC.

Like MoneyMarket II, IMEX II is a real-time trade processing system that incorporates the front and back offices. MMS is in the process of integrating the two systems, says Jerry Cristoforo, vice president of technology. "Sharing database information between the two systems will increase the efficiency of both," he says.

Transaction details are entered into IMEX II in the front office by either a trader or his assistant. Once a trade has been entered, the system does not allow information to be changed as a security precaution.

If an error is made, a trade can be cancelled and the correct details entered. IMEX II prints a hard copy of the cancelled trade, reverses the on-line position and creates a record of the cancelled trade in a separate historical file. A daily audit report is issued of all cancelled trades.

Once a trade has been entered, currency positions, global limits and exposures are automatically updated and can be viewed on screens in the trading room. Limits can be set in terms of trader, currency, customer and parent company.

Positions can be recorded in up to four currencies -- a home office currency, a base currency and two dealing currencies. In the back office, a general ledger entry is automatically generated when a trade is input into the system. IMEX II includes a standard interface that allows settlements to be made through SWIFT.

To give users greater flexibility in structuring deals, IMEX II allows trades to be entered without settlement instructions. Daily reports inform the operations department of trades with impending maturity dates and open settlement instructions.

IMEX II's report writer function provides detail and summary reports on a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual basis.