In other FinTech news, the SEC & NYU are hosting an ETP forum, the SS&C Learning Institute focuses on fiduciary duties, and Kempen Capital Management will deploy SimCorp’s Coric.
eVestment to Join Nasdaq’s Global Information Services Group
The Nasdaq Stock Market is moving to acquire vendor eVestment, a content and analytics provider, in a bid by the exchanges company to “deliver attractive shareholder returns” via a company whose client base includes asset managers, investment consultants and asset owners, officials report.
Nasdaq will pay $705 million to acquire eVestment via “a mix of debt and cash on hand,” officials say.
“The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2017,” according to Nasdaq. “The acquisition supports the company’s ambition to deliver double digit shareholder returns to shareholders. The company intends to reduce leverage toward its long-term debt/EBITDA targets, and it will continue to pursue its capital return objectives, including growing the dividend as earnings and cash flow grow, and executing the share buyback program with the primary objective of offsetting the impact of equity issuances.”
eVestment offers a suite of cloud-based solutions for the institutional investing community. Its database is intended to offer institutional investors ways to facilitate institutional investment decisions for traditional and alternative strategies, “including as many as 2,800 individual data points on more than 74,000 investment vehicles,” officials say. eVestment reports that it has more than 2,000 clients, including 92 percent of “the top asset managers, 76 percent of the top consulting firms and 80 percent of the top 20 pension funds.”
When the acquisition is complete, eVestment will be added to Nasdaq’s Global Information Services business, and will enhance those offerings “by allowing the company to broaden its reach into the buy side and leverage the extensive expertise of the leadership team,” according to Nasdaq. “Nasdaq’s data and index operations, coupled with eVestment’s institutional focus, will result in the creation of new solutions and expanded distribution to support the asset management community.”
The alignment to come will include Nasdaq’s “surveillance technology, SMARTS, our recent Analytics Hub launch, as well as our long standing operation of the Mutual Fund Quotation Service, will further expand our buy-side relationships, accelerate our growth opportunities, and advance our objectives to deliver proprietary analytics to our clients,” says Adena Friedman, president and CEO of Nasdaq in a statement.
“Our leadership team is excited to join Nasdaq. We believe the combined organization will allow us to grow our core business while tapping into Nasdaq’s technology expertise, leading data and software products, and global distribution,” says Jim Minnick, CEO and co-founder of eVestment, in a statement. “We’ve grown this business at a 12 percent annual growth rate since 2013, and together, we expect to produce new and expanded opportunities for our clients by combining our proprietary capabilities with Nasdaq’s core information services offerings.”
In addition to trading venues, Nasdaq provides clearing, exchange technology, listing, information and public company services.
SEC & NYU Hosting Forum on Exchange-Traded Products
The SEC and New York University (NYU) are joining forces to host a forum on September 8 in Washington, D.C., to review the “fast growing market for exchange-traded products [ETPs] and its implications for investors,” officials say.
“The event, hosted by SEC’s Division of Economic and Risk Analysis and NYU’s Salomon Center for the Study of Financial Institutions, will bring together regulators, industry members, and academics for a half-day dialogue on September 8,” according to an official release. “It will kick off with welcoming remarks by [SEC] Commissioner Michael Piwowar at 9:15 a.m. and conclude following remarks by Commissioner Kara Stein at 1:00 p.m.”
Exchange-traded products, “once novel instruments, now account for nearly one-third of trading volume on U.S. exchanges. It is important that we examine the impact of these products on our markets and Main Street investors,” says SEC Chairman Jay Clayton in a statement. “We are pleased to collaborate with NYU on this event and I thank my fellow Commissioners for their participation.”
ETP instruments were introduced in 1993 and the market has “expanded to nearly 2,000 different securities holding more than $2.7 trillion of assets,” according to the SEC. “While the first ETPs tracked stock-market indices, the market now includes ETPs that track other market indices as well as actively managed ETPs that invest in stocks, bonds, commodities, currencies, futures, options, and other derivative products.”
The event, free and open to the public, will be held at SEC headquarters at 100 F Street NE, Washington, D.C., and webcast at DERA Events, officials say. Attendees are asked to register in advance.
SS&C Learning Institute Launches Course on Fiduciary Conduct
The SS&C Learning Institute, part of the systems, services and software provider SS&C Technologies, is launching its “Fiduciary Code of Conduct” course for financial advisors, report SS&C officials.
The course is intended to define “a uniform decision-making framework that is based on fiduciary best practices, FINRA rules, and financial planning principles,” officials add.
The course was developed by SS&C Learning Institute Senior Fellow, Don Trone, who will also lead the course. His credits include being the co-founder and CEO of 3ethos, and founder of the Foundation for Fiduciary Studies. An author of 10 books on fiduciary responsibility and portfolio management, Trone has been a fiduciary governance advocate for more than 30 years, officials say.
“The Fiduciary Code of Conduct” course is available online or as an instructor-led classroom experience, officials add.
Kempen to Use SimCorp’s Coric to Improve Client Reporting
Asset manager Kempen Capital Management N.V. (KCM), based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, has picked solutions provider SimCorp’s Coric to replace an unidentified “incumbent legacy reporting solution” in a move “designed to increase operational efficiency and agility across its client services teams and to improve the experience it delivers to its clients,” officials say.
Coric is an enterprise client communications and reporting solution for private wealth and institutional asset management firms.
KCM, a fully owned subsidiary of Kempen & Co N.V., is licensed as a manager of various UCITS and AIFs and authorized to provide investment services, officials say. KCM offers investment solutions to pension funds, insurance companies, PPIs and other institutional clients.
Kempen, which has €49.5 billion ($58.9 billion) in assets under management (AUM), serves a range of clients with many information needs, officials say. SimCorp is a vendor of investment management solutions and services.
“Following a review of existing processes, Kempen identified a number of inefficiencies, including high levels of manual processing, low operational agility, and a lack of proper report governance,” according to vendor and Kempen officials. “Having examined relevant solutions in the market, Kempen found SimCorp Coric to be the optimal solution to address these inefficiencies.”
The SimCorp Coric installation will help Kempen with its front office operations via report generation tools for individual client requests, officials say. In addition, Coric is intended to “mitigate operational risk by reducing manual processes, for instance when it comes to reconciling data and conducting commentary management. Kempen will also use SimCorp Coric’s production control dashboards to provide management oversight of the report production process,” officials add.
“We are pleased to be working with SimCorp Coric on this initiative,” says Erik Luttenberg, chief operating officer (COO) at Kempen, in a statement. “Client reporting is an important focus area for us in the attempt to provide a superior client experience.”
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