Farewell from the Data Desk

Changes are coming for me and for Inside Reference Data, theNovember print edition of which will be the last before IRD and Inside Market Data are merged into a new monthly magazine (both will retain their present form for online news and other content). As it happens, at the same time, I’m departing my role and the company at this time.

Over the years, the perspective I took in these columns is that there are inevitably going to be many imperfections in data management operations, but there are exciting ways of thinking about how to correct issues or innovate and think differently about data concepts. I’ve found, in the past five years of editing Inside Reference Data, that covering data concerns reveals one’s own imperfections, in understanding and portraying what matters to readers, but hopefully it developed my ability to provoke thought about this industry’s data management issues. So please indulge me one last time as I look back at the sweep of developments I’ve covered and tried to provide insights about, for a few parting thoughts.

Following the LEI’s Evolution

Implementation of the legal entity identifier (LEI) has had many twists and turns over the past five years. It still has a few years to go to reach the goal set by the body that now administers it, the Global Legal Entity Identifier Foundation (GLEIF). GLEIF did not exist when I began this role, and in my very first online column as editor, I suggested that a non-profit organization might not be the most effective way to implement the LEI. GLEIF has proven me wrong, but not completely, because it does lean on assigning responsibility to for-profit providers in specific individual markets. So perhaps that column was at least half right.

Along the way, the LEI picked up steam as European regulations such as Mifid II, Emir and Basel III required firms to better track their transactions and holdings. These rules presage a complication in LEI implementation that has become apparent—differences allowed by local operating systems. The interests of local for-profit service providers can make standardization and reconciliation of LEIs more difficult. Standardization has become key to addressing quality and verification issues with LEIs that had emerged by early 2015. Just this past summer, GLEIF launched an LEI verification effort. Now, when only about a quarter of GLEIF’s goal of two million LEI registrations is complete, the effort, which includes removal of lapsed LEIs, is already underway. Therefore, GLEIF has demonstrated aptitude and credibility as it heads into the latter phases of instituting LEIs. Although many more still need to be registered, the identifier is well on its way.

Please indulge me one last time as I look back at the sweep of developments I’ve covered and tried to provide insights about.

Finding Applicable Innovations

The columns I most enjoyed writing considered how artificial intelligence, technology advances, management theories—and even pop cultural portrayals of such business and technology topics—could relate to improvement of data management. For instance, the way the brain processes signals is a lot like how data systems process information. Understanding that similarity can serve as a foundation for innovative ways to perceive information, including financial data. Artificial intelligence (AI) pops up from time to time in the movies and pop culture, which consider how AI acts on volumes of data far greater than human beings can handle. The industry, however, is still trying to figure out how to make AI more viable and accessible for all its participants. Innovation can be dazzling, but solid data governance and management plans are a necessary foundation. The first step before any plans or any innovation are implemented should be consulting with the data managers and technology staff who “walk the walk” with data users.

Finally, if any of these insights prove to be as on-target five years from now as my first thoughts on LEIs were five years ago—or if any readers look back on them as useful food for thought in the years ahead—I would be pleased to know that the approach, at least, was the right one.