The US Securities and Exchange Commission’s recent US$152,553 fine against mega hedge fund administrator Northern Trust provides a clear sign the regulatory agency will continue to hold a service provider accountable for any wrongdoing committed by its client if the SEC thinks it could have prevented the bad apple’s actions. The New York headquartered L-R […]
Race to the Patent Office for Syndicated Loan Blockchain
The results of a behind the scenes battle brewing between blockchain technology startup Hashlynx and mega-bank Bank of America to win a patent for a distributed ledger-based technology platform could end up determining how the operational difficulties inherent in the US$2 trillion paper-intensive syndicated loans market are eliminated and by whom. Whoever is awarded a […]
National Banks as Digital Asset Custodians: Big Deal or Not?
When it comes to picking a custodian for cryptocurrencies and other digital assets, the US Office of the Comptroller’s decision to green light national and state banks might not be that much of a gamechanger for every fund manager. At least not in the short-term. Currently, investors holding cryptocurrency can keep their cryptocurrency in a […]
Etrading Software; Bloomberg-Kaiko Vie for Crypto ID Authority
If equities, bonds, and OTC derivatives have identification codes why shouldn’t digital assets? That’s the premise Etrading Software and the team of Bloomberg and Kaiko are betting on by recently throwing their hats in the ring to provide ID codes as the new registration authority for digital token identifiers (DTIs) expected to go live sometime […]
COVID 19: Custody Network Management Revisited
If fund managers can outsource middle and back-office operations and even trading desks, why can’t global custodians outsource network management due diligence and monitoring? That’s the question over a dozen former global custody network managers who spoke with FinOps Report over the past month are asking as concerns mount that the COVID-19 pandemic could eventually […]
EU’s New Shareholder Rights Directive: What Standards?
With Europe’s second incarnation of the Shareholder Rights Directive (SRD II) less than four months away, the securities industry can easily rely on automated communication channels to ease the compliance burden, but using disparate message standards to transmit data and various methodologies for calculating fees will still make the administrative work challenging. The European Commission […]
OCC’s DLT for Sec Finance: Broker Reconciliations Gone?
Securities finance operations managers at US broker-dealers clearing their securities loan deals through the Options Clearing Corp. (OCC) could soon reduce if not eliminate time-consuming manual reconciliation work thanks to its new distributed ledger technology-based platform. Once OCC’s new DLT-based securities finance infrastructure is up and running, its 72 broker-dealer users would have real-time access […]
Coronavirus :The Corporate Actions Side Effect
Corporate actions analysts and operations managers working remotely during the coronavirus pandemic could unintentionally end up leaving money on the table as they scramble to deal with companies either postponing some events or changing the terms of others. That’s what Jonny Ruck, chief executive officer at London- headquartered corporate actions analytics technology firm Scorpeo is […]
Vote Confirmation: Devil in the Operations Details
Determining whether a vote was actually counted at a corporate meeting has resurrected a sparring match among transfer agents, financial intermediaries, issuers and Broadridge Financial over how to operationally get the job done. Among the participants on a new end-to-end vote confirmation committee set up by the Securities and Exchange Commission to address the issue, […]
Suspicious Activity Reports: Should Absolute or Qualified Immunity Apply?
US anti-money laundering compliance managers may have to think twice before filing suspicious activity reports (SARs) depending on what the Supreme Court decides in a case involving Fidelity Brokerage Services. The petition filed by AER Advisors and two of its clients William J. Deutsch, chairman of Deutsch Family Wine & Spirits in White Plains, New […]