(Editor’s Note: On Sept 14 itBit announced that its flagship Bankchain and other post-trade projects would be run out of a new firm Paxos with the same management. The former itBit, would be a division of Paxos, and continue to operate its crypto-currency trading platform). If US blockchain afficionados have their way, the technology […]
Reporting Securities Finance Deals: More is Less?
Say what, say who, say when? That’s the reaction of fund managers, custodians and market infrastructures to the European Securities and Market Authority’s request for feedback on a new regulation requiring reporting information on securities finance transactions to trade repositories. Market players complain that ESMA’s technical specifications for complying with the Securities Finance Transaction Regulation […]
Fund Managers to SEC: Change DTCC, ICE Swaps Rules
Fund managers are asking the Securities and Exchange Commission to force Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. and ICE to adapt their rulebooks to match their limited reporting responsibilities for security-based swap transactions. The Asset Management Group (AMG) and Investment Company Institute (ICI) say that the DTCC’s Trade Repository and the ICE Trade Vault have overstepped the […]
FATCA, GATCA Tax Patience of Relationship Managers
Relationship managers on the front-lines of interacting with investors or customers say that complying with the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) and its global version Common Reporting Standards (CRS) is giving them plenty of angst. The requirement to identify the investor or customer for tax purposes may conflict with the equally important need to […]
New TBA Margin Rules: Fund Managers, Brokers Retrench
Asset managers and broker-dealers will have to revamp some of their relationship terms, as well as those with the underlying investors, to meet the pending margin requirements for to-be-announced (TBA) transactions and other forward-settling fixed-income transactions. Panelists and attendees at a recent afternoon conference held by the Securities Industry and Financial Market Association about the Financial Industry […]
Catching an Insider Data Thief
Ten percent of employees will never commit a crime, ten percent of employees will, while 80 percent will only do so if the opportunity arises, predict fraud experts. It is that opportunity which asset management firms need to prevent through a combination of compliance controls and technology, say panelists and attendees at a recent symposium […]
Transfer Agents, DTC Still Chilly On Issuer Freeze Policies (Updated)
(Editor’s note: On December 6, 2016 the SEC finally published its acceptance of DTC’s rule changes affecting how it will impose chills and locks on US corporate issuers. The agency’s decision marks the end of a contentious debate between DTC, issuers and their transfer agents. Still, reservations remain. “The vast majority of the new rules […]
Fund Operations Managers Weather UK’s Brexit Storm
While the UK and European Union leaders will have two years to come up with a gameplan for how the UK will separate from the European Union, middle and back-office operations professionals at fund management shops are taking it one day at a time during extreme market volatility. The UK’s legal limbo has caused higher trading […]
AML De-Risking: Regulators Warn No Big Brooms
Regulators on both sides of the Atlantic are putting banks in a Catch-22 of established regulatory penalties for serving financial criminals while simultaneously warning them that cleaning house by category will attract their attention. Recent announcements by the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) suggest that banks better […]
SEC to Fund Administrators: You Are Liable for Client Fraud (Updated)
(Editor’s Note: On July 25, 2016 Apex Fund Services announced two hires for compliance. It appointed Nitin Khanapurkar as global head of risk and compliance oversight. Apex’s Luxembourg unit tapped Sonja-Maria Hilkhuijsen as head of European compliance and data protection. Khanapurkar was previously senior partner at KPMG while Hilkhuijsen was chief compliance and data protection […]