Well, its official… according to the Wall Street Journal, Jon Stewart is “the Most Powerful Economic Force in the U.S.” So powerful in fact, that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner went to Stewart for a private, off-the-record meeting back in April. A Treasury spokesman said “Jon Stewart is influential in America, so we took the opportunity
Back-Office
UCITS IV –Scared of Commitment?
Guest Contributer: Steve Carrier-Simon, Buy-side Sentinel Product Manager, Fidessa The implications of UCITS IV are being widely debated. And market watchers will all have their own areas of interest. What will be the tax issues? What will it mean for cross border mergers? How will master feeder structures be affected? Etc…etc The area that got
Back-Office
The Fed: Helping or Hurting?
The Federal Reserve recently began implementing their plan to help boost the U.S. economy – their $600 billion plan. The result: the S&P 500 immediately tumbled, reaching its greatest loss in three months. I’m not outright saying that there is a direct correlation; however, it is something to think about. The Fed announced their stimulus
Derivatives
The Volcker Rule – Say What?
While flipping through the Wall Street Journal last Monday, I did my usual scan of the Money & Investing section. Being that our 5th Annual OTC Derivatives Operations & Processing conference was days away, I settled on a front page article about the infamous Messrs Dodd and Frank. As I started to read the article
Conference and Event Planning
What Makes a Great Speaker Great?
At the end of each conference that Financial Technologies Forum hosts, we collect evaluations that rate how well each of our speakers did throughout the day on a 1 to 5 scale, 5 being excelleing and 1 being poor, as well as how the attendees felt about the conference content. Following our 5th Annual OTC
Back-Office
Derivatives – Devil or Angel?
Guest Contributor: Phil Sindel, Executive Director, Olmstead Associates, Inc. Say the word derivatives to some people and watch them begin to sweat, shake and think about widows and orphans being thrown out on the street. Derivatives appear to have pretty bad public relations! They have been blamed for everything from the current financial crisis to
Corporate Actions
Individual Investors are Making a Comeback
Standard & Poor’s index is up 17 percent since late August, and other statistics are also showing that the market is improving slowly but surely. These improvements may be causing a bullish atAAIItitude and drawing individual investors back into the market. Last week, in a survey conducted by the American Association of Individual Investors to
Clearing and Settlement
The CFTC Gives the CME Group a ‘Time Out’
According to an article in the Financial Times last week, the CFTC is frustrated with the CME Group in what seems to parallel a typical adult/adolescent disagreement that arises when new rules are put in place. The disagreement stems from the mandatory position limits that are to be introduced into the futures market as outlined
Derivatives
Election Outcome Undecided… For Financial Regulation That Is
This week, as we all know, was election week, and the results, while perhaps not shocking, are sure to send a surge of changes down Wall Street yet again, but how big are these changes really going to be? While the Republicans now control the House, the control of the Senate still lies with the
Clearing and Settlement
OTC Derivatives – More Regulations and Reform
In case you didn’t already know, last week in Amsterdam Sibos brought together members of the financial industry to discuss topics that “matter most, across business areas, across functions and across regions.” This year one of the topics discussed were OTC derivatives and the current shift of placing more risk on the CCPs. With our
