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 […]
COVID-19: Addressing Return to Work Legal Quirks
The eventual return of Wall Street’s trading and operations executives to their physical offices as the coronavirus pandemic subsides could end up being a cause for litigation and employee angst, rather than celebration, if C-suite executives don’t carefully balance profit-making with worker safety. Knowing when employees can come back to work is the easiest part […]
SEI Sues SS&C For Threatening to Shut Advent/Moxy Access
Fund administrator SEI Global Services has sued rival SS&C Technology Holdings and subsidiary SS&C Advent for allegedly trying to put SEI out of business by cutting off its access to critical portfolio accounting technology SEI needs to service its fund manager clients. The lawsuit, filed in the US District Court in the SEI’s backyard in […]
CSDR: Partial Settlement Means a Full Ops Headache
In permitting partial settlement of securiies transactions to relieve financial penalties, the new European Central Securities Depository Regulation (CSDR) will unintentionally cause fund managers, broker-dealers and others more operational grief. The CSDR is designed to harmonize the operating rules for all national European securities depositories, including using the same methodology to calculate fines when trades […]
Coronavirus: Survival Tips for Middle Office Fund Ops
The coronavirus pandemic is frazzling even the best trained middle-office operations managers of US fund management shops who are working in the trenches of a battlezone. The war isn’t about setting up remote access to IT systems for employees having to work from home or deciding who should do which task and when. Following a […]
BNY Mellon Gives Fund Managers New NAV Agent
Fund managers no longer have to rely on their fund administrator’s backup plan or their own when striking or validating a net asset value. BNY Mellon, the world’s largest custodian bank, says it can save the day by doing all the operational work using Milestone Group’s pControl platform which also allows for accurate backup NAVs […]
Goodbye NSCC: Hello Paxos for Clearing US Equities?
US clearinghouses, such as the National Securities Clearing Corp. (NSCC), could become either a thing of the past or take a backseat, if custodian Paxos has its way in clearing and settling US securities. The US Securities and Exchange Commission’s recent no-action letter to Paxos allows the firm to serve as a clearinghouse for a […]
Initial Swaps Margin: Facing Final Custodian Interactions
Investment funds, which have to meet initial margin requirements for uncleared derivative transactions in 2020 and 2021, will soon find that their biggest legal and middle-office challenges could be dealing with custodian banks. Far more investment funds will be affected by the final phases of initial margin requirements than in the initial four phases, starting […]
California’s Data Privacy Law: Sticky GDPR Differences
What is personal data? Who is your customer? What is the sale of data? For chief data privacy and technology officers who think that the new California Consumer Protection Act (CCPA) is just a mini-version of Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) answering these three simple questions could make them change their minds. Getting them […]