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 […]
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 […]
Seeking Depository: Call Ireland’s Central Bank (Updated)
Update (May 3, 2018) Bank and broker-dealer members of Euroclear UK & Ireland now have to worry about where they will settle trades in Irish equities post-Brexit. They will no longer be able to do so through the shared UK and Irish depository and parent Euroclear recently announced that it has abandoned plans to set […]
New Tax on US Convertible Bonds: Taxing Air?
The US Internal Revenue Service wants withholding agents to collect tax on upticks of the rights of convertible bondholders, despite protests that the levy is nothing more than “tax on air.” That’s how some tax attorneys and operations specialists view the IRS’ Section 305(c) rule on taxing adjustments to the conversion ratio of US convertible financial instruments, as […]
Pre-Release ADRs: More SEC Fines on the Way?
First ITG. Who is next? That is the question fund managers and other investors are asking themselves after learning that the US Securities and Exchange Commission fined broker-dealer ITG $24.4 million for violating regulations on how it used the pre-released shares of American Depositary Receipts (ADRs). The SEC says that ITG violated Section 17(a)3 of […]
Euroclear Bank Taskizes Failed Settlements
Banks and broker-dealer members of international securities depository Euroclear Bank in Brussels will now find it a lot easier to clean up trades which failed to settle on time. Euroclear, which specializes in settling Eurobonds and cross-border transactions of domestic equities and fixed-income instruments, is offering its participants a free cloud-based platform to communicate information […]
T+2 in Canada: Affirmations in the Headlights Again
Canada and the US are in lockstep to shorten their settlement cycle from three days to two days on September 5, 2017, but Canada is taking its preparations one step further when it comes to the critical post-trade function of matching trade details. The Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA), the umbrella organization representing all of Canada’s […]
Equity Derivatives Withholding Tax Remains Taxing (Updated)
(Editor’s Note: On November 14, 2016 SIFMA asked the US Treasury to postpone the implementation date of IRS Section 871(m) from January 1, 2017 so that it can resolve a difference of opinion with G5 countries. The UK, Germany, Spain, France, and Italy have told the Treasury that dividend equivalent payments made outside the US […]
Blockchain for US Settlement: Three, Two, One, Takeoff? (Update)
(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 […]
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 […]