Opinion

ISO 20022 - The Next Generation

The future looks promising for ISO 20022 and organizations that use it as the basis for managing their inter-company and enterprise-wide reference data processes, says London Market Systems' Martin Sexton

Editor's Letter - Coming, ready or not

Hedge fund registrations in the US are back on the agenda. But this time the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has some heavy-hitting artillery behind it in the form of the recently introduced Hedge Fund Transparency Act in the US Senate and the…

Twittering on the trading floor

Social networking site meets buy-side trading? The latest Web 2.0 phenomenon, Twitter, functions in many of the same ways as its mainstream brethren, MySpace and Facebook, but its uses continue to evolve. Perhaps the most interesting development is that…

Reining in derivatives

Expectations are high that new US Congressional efforts to require hedge fund registration with the SEC will succeed this year, opening the door to greater oversight of the industry by a regulator no doubt eager to prove its mettle following the…

The evolving role of the buy-side project manager

The buy side is currently facing a number of acute challenges including the need to improve the efficiency and discipline of business processes, implement technology to enhance client service, manage risk, support the introduction of new asset classes…

... But Tie Up Your Camel

As President Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act into law last week, it felt as if the U.S. had passed a major milestone in dealing with the current economic meltdown.

One Moment in Time

Hindsight is always 20-20, so the saying goes. Of course it is; when the time comes to look back, we have facts to hand that may not have been available when we had to take action. While some decisions should never be made on gut feeling, financial…

New Game, New Players

After months of anticipation about who lead the London Stock Exchange (LSE) Group in the post-Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (Mifid) world, exchange officials announced at press time that former Lehman Brothers executive Xavier Rolet would…

The Continuing Story of Stimulus Bill

Last week, Alex "A-Rod" Rodriguez, slugger for the New York Yankees baseball team, admitted to taking performance-enhancing substances while at the Texas Rangers. Many fans recoiled in shock and dismay, but others wondered how the buff-looking A-Rod had…

Automation Without Automatons

Automation has sometimes had a bad rap in our industry, especially when research reports raised the specter of trading algorithms displacing human traders in a Terminator -esque depiction of trading floors of the future. With a major economic stimulus…

Picking Your Poison

I've always found it prudent to stay away from holy wars, both the religious ones and the technological ones-be they Mac vs. PC, proprietary vs. open source, or Ethernet vs. Token Ring. These arguments always remind me of the conversations I had growing…

Trimming the Fat? Or Cutting to the Bone?

In the event that we're lucky enough not to know someone whose job has been directly affected by the financial crisis, the current layoff frenzy sweeping the entire economy serves as a reminder that although the recession may have been sparked by…

Get it Right the First Time Around

Firms with effective data management practices will be better suited to adhere to coming Gips requirements, say Eagle Investment Systems' Joseph McDonagh and Danielle Newland

Editor's Letter - Back in black

No, this editorial is not a poorly disguised attempt at paying homage to AC/DC's 1980 album of the same name.

CSAs set for dramatic change

The demise of Lehman Brothers in September last year was a wake-up call to asset managers and other investors that the single-broker aggregator model for managing commission sharing agreements (CSAs) has its flaws. Reliance on a single equity broker to…