Regulatory reform, competitive pressures and the need to optimize data across the enterprise are pushing custodians, service providers, consultants and securities firms to constantly refine their reference data management strategies. As their strategies evolve, all players in the operations matrix will have to hone their relationships with their market data vendors, which should be collaborative… Read More >>
How to Take On Cyber Fraud
Financial services firm can do lot to prevent “a digital Pearl Harbor” caused by cyber fraud and effective ways to combat such attacks were the focus of a session at FTF’s 5th Annual Hedge Fund Operations & Technology Conference, held yesterday in New York. In their session, David Z. Bodenheimer and Linda Lerner, two anti-fraud… Read More >>
Your Financial IT Spend in 2012
Taken together, two key surveys provide a snapshot of how you and your fellow market participants are allocating your financial technology dollars in 2012. Not surprisingly, the regulatory overhaul of over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives trading is the single biggest budget driver. It’s also no shock that the buy side is still dragging its feet on the… Read More >>
A Thousand Points of Light on the OTC Front
To paraphrase a former president, there are “a thousand points of light” when it comes to activity on the over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives execution, clearing and valuation fronts. Variety abounds as State Street touts a platform that will compete against sell-side offerings and major sell-side players such as BNP Paribas gear up to ready offerings for… Read More >>
Taking the Mobile Challenge
As mobile technologies gain ground, they will challenge incumbent systems and practices. A case in point is a new app for the iPad created via a version of a portfolio management system that has mobile reporting capabilities. The easier and more timely access to middle and back office data will test the conventions about front,… Read More >>
Time to Disrupt Your AML System?
Anti-money laundering (AML) for financial services firms is evolving as they broaden their usage of the behavior detection at the heart of AML and begin to consolidate AML and anti-fraud platforms. Firms may also see their governments refine AML and related policies as a result of the latest recommendations of a standards body urging countries… Read More >>
The Cyber-Attacks Are Getting Worse
As I predicted in previous postings, the cyber-attacks have gotten worse. Earlier this week, “hacktivists” slammed the websites of Nasdaq OMX, Bats Trading, the Chicago Board Options Exchange and Bursa Malaysia, causing outages although trading systems were spared. These latest attacks make clear that financial centers can no longer ignore these threats and that they… Read More >>
Welcome to Clawback Season
In theory, we are in bonus season. But it’s looking more like clawback season as banks give bonuses more in line with performance. A case in point is UBS, which for the first time in its history is taking back part of the bonuses slated for its investment bankers, according to a report in the… Read More >>
Justified Paranoia?
My paranoia last month may have been justified. I wrote about the Occupy London protesters wanting to camp out near the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and the cyber-attacks between Israeli and Arab hackers as harbingers of more trouble to come. It looks as if not only was I was right but there needs to be… Read More >>
The Cyber-Battles Have Begun
Call me paranoid but I see a more troubling cyber-battle brewing in the Middle East than in Washington, DC where pending anti-piracy legislation caused Wikipedia to take a day off. Israeli and Arab hackers have been attacking the websites and systems of stock exchanges, among other targets, and I worry it’s a harbinger of things… Read More >>
