Waters
AFTAs 2017: Best Compliance Initiative—Bank of America Merrill Lynch
With the announcement of the Department of Labor’s (DOL) Fiduciary Rule, asset managers have been exploring how to meet their increased regulatory compliance needs. Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BAML), winner of this year’s best compliance initiative,…
AFTAs 2017: Best Trading Infrastructure Provider—Cobalt
Post-trade shared-ledger platform Cobalt wins this year’s best trading infrastructure provider at the AFTAs, knocking off previous winner, Trumid Financial. The win comes down to Cobalt’s private network that leverages distributed-ledger technology (DLT)…
AFTAs 2017: All the Winners and Why they Won
At a dinner held in midtown Manhattan on December 4 last year, the winners of the 2017 AFTAs were announced. Here is the winners' list and the reasons why they won.
AFTAs 2017: Best Technology Executive: Buy Side—Mike Urciuoli, JPMorgan Asset & Wealth Management
JPMorgan Asset and Wealth Management (AWM) CIO Mike Urciuoli wins this year’s best technology executive (buy side) award, commanding a technology budget of over $1 billion. After taking the reins at AWM in 2014, Urciuoli embarked on a period of radical…
AFTAs 2017: Best Cloud Initiative—Northern Trust
It’s easy to think that after years of discussion, cloud is old hat for financial services firms. But the process of fully moving to a cloud-based architecture requires not only a change in technology but also in the mindset of developers, as Northern…
AFTAs 2017: Most Cutting-Edge IT Initiative—JPMorgan Asset & Wealth Management
A key strategy in JPMorgan Asset and Wealth Management’s Quantitative Beta Strategies (QBS) team lies in event-driven investing, specifically in systematically investing in M&A deals, alongside equity long/short strategies. But the team struggled with…
AFTAs 2017: Best Reporting Initiative—State Street Corporation
From June 2018, the largest registered investment companies—those with net-asset values of over $1 billion—will be required to comply with the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Investment Company Reporting Modernization Rule. Existing forms,…
AFTAs 2017: Best IT Integration Initiative—Cowen
When Cowen announced that it was acquiring Convergex in April 2017, it was looking for a swift close to the deal—in just three months, the agency broker would become a full part of its new parent, renamed and rebadged to reflect that change. For CIO Ann…
2017 AFTAs Winners' Circle: Imagine Software
After winning the coveted vendor innovation category for risk, compliance and reporting at this year’s AFTAs, James Rundle sits down with Imagine Software’s CEO, Lance Smith, to talk about risk, regulation, and what’s coming up in 2018.
AFTAs 2017: Most Innovative Third-Party Technology Vendor—Risk, Compliance and Reporting—Imagine Software
The hallmark of a truly innovative technology vendor is its ability to rapidly respond to changes in the market and address its clients’ demands by developing and delivering a new solution that provides exactly what is required of it. New York-based…
AFTAs 2017: Most Innovative Third-Party Technology Vendor—Infrastructure—UnaVista
UnaVista, the London Stock Exchange Group’s (LSEG’s) platform for matching, reconciliation and reporting, makes its debut at the AFTAs as winner of the most innovative third-party technology vendor (infrastructure) category, at a time when industry focus…
AFTAs 2017: Most Innovative Third-Party Technology Vendor—Front Office—Overbond
Front-office technology platforms might be working hard to address demands for greater holistic functionality, but when there’s a specific challenge to tackle—the digitization of the corporate and government bond market, for example—precise solutions are…
AFTAs 2017: Most Innovative Third-Party Technology Vendor—Middle and Back Office—S3 Partners
New York-based S3 Partners has enjoyed success in the annual Buy-Side Technology Awards over the past three years, taking home awards for best newcomer, best big data technology provider and best data analytics tools. It was only a matter of time,…
AFTAs 2017: Best Use of the Agile Methodology—Confluence
The prominence of the Agile development methodology has exploded within the financial technology sphere in recent years as both vendor and end-user firms have looked to release new functionality on a continual basis, with release cycles being reduced to…
Waters Wavelength Podcast Episode 104: Regulators Struggle with AI; SS&C Snaps up DST Systems
Should regulators take a more active role when it comes to AI oversight, or leave it to the professionals? What will M&A look like in 2018?
AFTAs 2017: Best Partnership or Alliance—Thomson Reuters and Symphony Communications
The best partnership or alliance category at the 2017 AFTAs goes to Thomson Reuters and Symphony Communications. Through the partnership, Thomson Reuters’ Eikon, the firm’s open financial markets desktop platform, is now integrated within Symphony, the…
2017 AFTAs Winners’ Circle: Thomson Reuters and Symphony Communications
After winning the best partnership category at this year’s AFTAs, Symphony’s CEO, David Gurle, and Thomson Reuters’ global head of platform and partners, Yvette Jackson, talk to James Rundle about the origins of the partnership and the power of…
2017 AFTAs Winners' Circle: SmartStream Technologies
Historically, collaboration between banks hasn’t yielded much success—except, perhaps, when it comes to reference data. James Rundle talks with Peter Moss, CEO of SmartStream’s Reference Data Utility (RDU), about how the project came about, and how it’s…
AFTAs 2017: Best Back-Office Initiative—SmartStream Technologies
SmartStream's win reflects markets' growing demand for regulatory solutions.
AFTAs 2017: Best New Technology Introduced Over the Last 12 Months: Infrastructure—Metamako
Sydney, Australia-based Metamako wins its first category in the AFTAs thanks to its E-Series of devices launched midway through last year, designed to run up to three field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) on a single platform, allowing end-users to…
AFTAs 2017: Best AI Technology Initiative—FIS
Control Centre uses a combination of traditional workflow rules and RPA.
AFTAs 2017: Best Collaboration Initiative—SS&C Advent and Maitland
The collaboration led to the integration of the firms' seperate data management solutions.
AFTAs 2017: Best Middle-Office Initiative—RIMES Technologies
This year RIMES Technologies takes home the award for the best middle-office initiative in the vendor section of the AFTAs, thanks to its work with institutional asset manager Fort Washington Investment Advisors. RIMES’ project with Fort Washington,…