Waters
Fund Managers Gear Up for AIFMD Costs, Compliance
With only six months to go until the July 22 deadline for fund managers to comply with the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive, Marina Daras looks at how the industry is gearing up in the homestretch.
Derivatives Trading Firms Weigh Audio Recording Approaches
Thanks to the latest Dodd–Frank provision in which derivatives transactions will be more closely monitored, many US traders will now have their conversations recorded. Jake Thomases investigates how that recording will be done and what will happen to the…
BofA's Bessant Embraces BYOD, Eyes Big Data's Interest vs. Impact
At a time when few institutions can countenance a wholesale technology reform program, Bank of America is storming ahead on the mobile front, in addition to undertaking a total infrastructural transformation and the goal of developing single platforms…
A data-centric approach to portfolio management
A fast, flexible and reliable investment decision-making process must be based on access to accurate and consistent information throughout an organization. The right portfolio management solution will underpin the creation of an enterprise-wide approach…
Bohemian Rhapsody: CIO Michal Sanak Leads Prague's RSJ with Smart Speed
RSJ, tucked on the left bank of the Vltava River in the Czech capital of Prague, has quietly become one of the world’s most active proprietary trading firms, despite its boutique size. As CIO and shareholder Michal Sanak tells Tim Bourgaize Murray, the…
Max Bowie: Cost, Regs, Volumes, Analytics to Drive Data Innovation in 2014
With economic woes hampering innovation in recent years, Max says the winds of change blowing from different directions may create a perfect storm of pressures that force the industry to consider new options in 2014.
Anthony Malakian: When the Love is Gone
In a world of new technologies—where evolution happens at breakneck speeds—Anthony says that buy-side firms need to employ new strategies when managing their third-party relationships. Perhaps they can learn a lesson or two from their sell-side brethren?
James Rundle: Imperfect Solutions
Most Western exchanges have implemented safety measures to mitigate share-price swings, but others are beginning to experience the algorithmic troubles that brought trading firms to their knees in recent years. Kill switches and circuit breakers don’t…
Michael Shashoua: The Way of the World
With respect to the spread of US and Euro-centric data management systems, as well as regulation to other regions, Michael points out that the difficulties in translating new standards and laws could highlight cultural differences that service providers…
License to Kill: The Complexity of Circuit Breakers
As regulators collaborate to review different concepts to protect the integrity of the US financial markets and reduce potential technology failures, Marina Daras looks at the technical challenges of implementing circuit breakers for brokers and…
Japan Eyes Further Transformation after Exchange Merger
The Japanese capital markets have undergone a series of changes over the past few years, first in response to the natural disasters that affected Asia’s regional hub, and later with the merger of the Osaka Securities Exchange and the Tokyo Stock Exchange…
Big Data Webcast: Analyze This
As a consequence of their participation in the capital markets, the necessary evils that all buy-side and sell-side firms have been forced to address include mounting data volumes, greater data varieties, and increased data velocity, all of which must be…
Utility Models: SmartStream Discusses Reconciliations
Dr. Darryl Twiggs, head of product at SmartStream Technologies, discusses the changing role of reconciliations as a process, and how new technologies are affecting its evolution within the back-office environment. Interview by James Rundle
January 2014: Do Algorithms Dream of Super-Fast Sheep?
While algorithms are far from sentient, Victor wonders what they would think about if they could.
AFTAs 2013: The Winners and Why They Won
It’s difficult to believe that Waters first unveiled the American Financial Technology Awards all the way back in 2005, although anyone who has worked in financial services for any length of time will appreciate the extent to which time flies in this…
AFTAs 2013: Best IT Team—BNY Mellon
There’s a reason why the best IT team category is the final announcement at the American Financial Technology Awards: It’s the highest profile, and therefore the most prized, of all 16 categories on offer. BNY Mellon’s IT team, under the tutelage of…
AFTAs 2013: Best Technology Executive, Sell-Side—Edwin Marcial, IntercontinentalExchange
Edwin Marcial joined the Continental Power Exchange, the company that would become ICE, in 1996, because he wanted to make an impression on a startup. He stayed put when it nearly went belly-up in 1999, when it became economically viable again overnight…
AFTAs 2013: Best Technology Executive, Buy-Side—Tom Miglis, Citadel
Since 2001, Tom Miglis’ steady hand has run technology at Ken Griffin’s Chicago-based Citadel Group. But despite his long tenure as CIO, Miglis wasn’t named best buy-side technology executive as a lifetime-achievement-type award, but rather because…
AFTAs 2013: Best Compliance Initiative—ConvergEx Group
Compliance and market surveillance are among the most important functions at any institutional trading firm. Given heightened regulatory scrutiny of the capital markets, that importance looks set to grow, but compliance teams often struggle with basic,…
AFTAs 2013: Best Mobile-Strategy Initiative—Morgan Stanley
Waters has written extensively in recent months about mobility and the idea that work is a thing you do, not a place you go. Firms across the industry are developing new mobile strategies, but it is Morgan Stanley’s Matrix Mobile rollout that won this…
AFTAs 2013: Best IT Integration Initiative—Bank of America Merrill Lynch
IT integration projects have an annoying habit of resembling icebergs: They might appear to be relatively rudimentary undertakings at the outset, but they invariably grow in complexity, timescale, and budget as they progress, often throwing up more…
AFTAs 2013: Best OTC Trading Initiative—State Street Corp.
If there’s one thing that 2013 will be remembered for in the capital markets, it will be that this was the year that swap execution facilities (SEFs) started operating. While State Street launched SwapEx in February 2012, it wasn’t until September 2013…
AFTAs 2013: Most Cutting-Edge IT Initiative—Blackstone
Park Avenue-based Blackstone Group wins what is traditionally the most competitive of the 16 categories on offer in the annual American Financial Technology Awards, thanks to its BXAccess integrated investor portal, a blend of cutting-edge technology,…
AFTAs 2013: Best Infrastructure Initiative—Bank of America
When it comes to financial technology, the key word has always been efficiency. For execution, that comes down to finding the right venues to trade with the best results for internal desks or external clients. For compliance, it’s about identifying and…