Sell-Side Technology/Analysis
First, React: Systems Performance Should Be Visually Evident, Not Contractual
Data tells the tale of what markets are doing, what's aberrant, and why rarely, if sometimes spectacularly, things go wrong. Systems performance tools provide those signals, just as exchange venues provide tick data. Firms are beginning to figure out how…
Three Technologists Talk About Justifying ROI
When making a case for the return on investment (ROI) of an IT project, BMO Capital Markets’ head of operations and project delivery doesn’t get too deep. Quantifying ROI is very difficult, argues Naveen Balakrishnan, because the measurables evolve too…
Meeting Transaction Tax 'What-Ifs' Demands Platform Flexibility
Financial transaction taxes (FTTs) may jive with political anxiety over the markets, but legislating them isn't so straightforward. Likewise, add-on solutions required to cope with the new levies must go well beyond a conventional fee calculator.
Exchanges Recognize Cyber Threats but Have Defensive Measures in Place
More than half of all worldwide exchanges have suffered a cyber attack in the last year, according to a survey by the International Organization of Securities Commissions (Iosco). Iosco released the results as part of a joint working paper with the World…
Guilty Bankers Should Be Counting Rocks on a Prison Beach, Says Consultant
Alex Jurshevski wasn't even supposed to appear on the over-the-counter (OTC) and central clearing panel at the Toronto Financial Information Summit. It was only because of flooding in the city that the founder of Recovery Partners, a consultancy, was…
Don't Equate Canadian OTC Derivatives Reform With US Reform
Much of what regulator Aaron Unterman had to say at the Toronto Financial Information Summit about Canadian over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives reform would have sounded familiar to any American in the audience. Canada’s approach to reform largely mirrors…
Mixed Start for SEF Registrations
Although the US Commodity Trading Futures Commission (CFTC) has finalized its rules regarding the operation of swap execution facilities (SEFs) and registration has been open for weeks, not all institutions have filed applications with the regulator as…
Counterparty Credit Models Herald New Workflows
Initial cost and hardware limitations are often tallied as potential problems for sell-side firms complying with new capital-charge requirements by optimizing netting strategies and collateral usage. Now those firms face a different challenge: where to…
For Big Data, the Mindset Outweighs the Concept
Panelists at the Asia-Pacific Trading Architecture Summit, held last week in Singapore, discussed the effect of big data on financial services firms, but remained skeptical that the widely debated phenomenon was anything more than a natural evolution…
CIMB Exec Advocates Tech Restraint in APTAS Keynote
Andrew Freyre-Sanders, managing director and head of execution services at CIMB Securities, warned against being swept up in technology arms races and stressed the need for intelligent systems design, while delivering the keynote address for the 2013…
Knight Capital and Getco Complete Transformation to KCG
With the completion of the merger between high-frequency trading (HFT) specialist Getco and broker-dealer Knight Capital, KCG was launched as a single entity on July 2, 2013, creating a securities firm of considerable size and scale in the US and global…
Cost Control Beneficial to Big Bank IT Departments
Panelists at the Asia-Pacific Trading Architecture Summit, held last week in Singapore, debated the current business climate when it comes to infrastructure management, saying that although budgets are tighter, this is introducing a needed element of…
In Asia, Fragmentation Creates Regional Technology Challenges
Panelists at the Asia-Pacific Trading Architecture Summit, held in Singapore last week, discussed the role that regulatory fragmentation is playing in forcing banks to develop complex, semi-siloed systems in order to operate in multiple countries while…
Legacy Concerns Risk Overriding Architecture Decisions at Banks
Panelists at the Asia-Pacific Trading Architecture Summit in Singapore last week debated the contrasts between staying current in terms of technology and managing tightened budget sheets, saying that the approaching end of the lifecycle for technology is…
TeraExchange Signs NFA for SEF Regulatory Services
The National Futures Association (NFA) has announced that TeraExchange has signed a pre-launch regulatory services agreement (RSA) with the industry body as part of its application to become a swap execution facility (SEF).
Q&A With Wolverine's Kevin Kernan
Kernan, director of product development at Wolverine Execution Services (WEX), dishes on his firm's algorithmic adaptations.
CFTC SEF Rules Garner Mixed Reactions as Tech Picture Gets Clearer
Yesterday’s vote on final rules governing the operation of swap execution facilities (SEFs) by the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) was well-received by a cross section of the industry, but some disagree with elements of the provisions…
CFTC Passes Final SEF Rules with an Eye to the Future
The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) passed a series of final rules yesterday, designed to govern how swap execution facilities (SEFs) will operate, and how instruments will trade through them.
MTS Prepares to Launch US Fixed-Income Platform
Fixed-income trading marketplace MTS has announced that it will launch a bond platform for US institutional entities, and has registered a US subsidiary in the process.
Back Office Vendors Talk About What's on Tap
A group of back office vendors at the Futures Industry Association (FIA) New York Expo had a chance to brag about the most exciting product they have on offer, or in the works. This is what they offered up.
2013 is a Year of Belt Tightening, Say Vendors
A rather grim picture was painted by vendors at the latest New York Expo of the Futures Industry Association. Margins are low on the sell side, which means fewer contracts for the problem solvers in the vendor community. The environment has vendors…
FICWG Eyes Cross-Asset Standardization
The Fixed Income Connectivity Working Group (FICWG) has completed its cash bond trading connectivity specification, and signed a number of inter-dealer brokers, exchanges and dealer-to-client platforms as adopters of the standard, expanding the fixed…
NATAS Panel: Big Data Governance, Mindset, Needs Work
Jennifer Costley, director of enterprise architecture at Credit Suisse, is critical of existing data governance structures at large financial institutions. Costley, who spoke at this week’s North American Trading Architecture Summit, says they need to…
Citi's Monaghan: PAI a Challenge; SEFs Will Route, Not Match
Neil Monaghan, Citi's global head of strategic business initiatives for over-the-counter (OTC) clearing told a North American Trading Architecture Summit audience that everything you thought you knew about post-trade technology is, in the newly cleared…