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New IDs for Digital Assets: FIGIs or ISO-Backed Codes?

February 22, 2021 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

Does the financial services industry need more than one identification standard for digital assets? Can standards for identifying traditional assets even apply for the digital asset market? Those are the two questions trading, compliance and operations managers at fund management firms, custodians, exchanges, and issuers of digital tokens will soon answer now that they have […]

Filed Under: Blockchains, Compliance, Crypto, Data, Middle Office Ops, Regulators, Standards Tagged With: Blockchain, Compliance, Crypto, Data, Middle Office Ops, Regulators, Standards

OCC’s DLT for Sec Finance: Broker Reconciliations Gone?

May 19, 2020 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Compliance, Innovation, Investors, Sec Lending Tagged With: Blockchain, Data, Middle Office Ops, Reconciliation, Regulators

BNY Mellon Gives Fund Managers New NAV Agent

February 13, 2020 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

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 […]

Filed Under: Compliance, Data, Funds, Investments, Outsourcing, Reporting Tagged With: Compliance, Data, Fund Ops, Middle Office Ops, Outsourcing, Reconciliation, Reporting, SEC, Valuation

Striking an NAV: Fund Managers’ Contingency Options

May 11, 2018 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

(Editor’s Update on December 5, 2018: US fund managers are getting serious about striking back-up NAVs on their own. Milestone Group tells FinOps Report that it has nabbed two top-tier US headuartered fund managers to use its pControl Oversight platform to monitor their fund administrators and  to strike back-up NAVs in-house, instead of relying on […]

Filed Under: Compliance, Data, Financials, Funds, Investments, Outsourcing, Reporting, Slider Tagged With: Compliance, Data, Fund Ops, Hedge Funds, Middle Office Ops, Outsourcing, Reconciliation, Reporting, SEC, Valuation

SEC 12b-1 Fee Amnesty: Costly Ops Work

April 6, 2018 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

A, B, C. Those three simple letters of the English alphabet could cause plenty of administrative grief for compliance and middle office operations managers at US mutual fund management firms over the next few months. That is, if they hope to take advantage of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s leniency program on overcharges to investors in […]

Filed Under: Analytics, Compliance, Funds, Investments, Investors, Post-Trade, Reporting, Rules, Slider Tagged With: Compliance, Fund Ops, Investment Ops, Middle Office Ops, Reporting, SEC

FINRA New Ops Certification: Two Exams Better?

March 12, 2018 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

What is the difference between a stock, a bond, a derivative, an exchange-traded fund and other financial products? What are customer suitability rules, margin rules and custody rules? These might sound like simple questions, but for US brokerage operations managers who must abide by changes in test formats imposed by the US Financial Industry Regulatory Authority […]

Filed Under: Compliance, Operations, Post-Trade, Slider, Standards Tagged With: AML, Brokerage Ops, Compliance, FINRA, KYC, Middle Office Ops, Post Trade, Standards

Middle-Office Blockchain: BNP Paribas, Broadridge

October 20, 2017 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

Recent announcements of blockchain pilots from BNP Paribas Securities Services and Broadridge Financial show how distributed ledger technology continues to make inroads into the post-trade arena. Both come with claims of operational efficiencies through a single indisputable source of data that reduces the potential for processing errors. BNP Paribas Securities Services project for corporate action […]

Filed Under: Corporate Actions, Data, Innovation, Operations, Post-Trade, Sec Lending, Slider, Trading Tagged With: Blockchain, Collateral, Corporate Actions, Custodians, Data, Middle Office Ops, Post Trade, Reconciliation

Morgan Stanley Fine: Lessons in Fee Recon Failures

October 13, 2017 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

Futures commision merchants had better pay far closer attention to their middle office fee reconciliation process, caution operations experts. Morgan Stanley’s recent US$500,000 fine from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) for overbilling clients trading fees isn’t a large fine considering the FCM’s size. What is alarming is that Morgan Stanley is the fourth FCM […]

Filed Under: Compliance, Derivatives, Regulations, Slider, Standards Tagged With: CFTC, Compliance, Derivatives, Middle Office Ops, Ops Risk, Outsourcing, Reconciliation, Regulators, Standards, Swaps

Countdown to US T+2: Five Last Minute Tips

August 30, 2017 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

It’s now or never when it comes being ready for the pending two-day settlement cycle in the US. With September 5, the day T+2 becomes effective, just around the corner, operations and IT managers are taking the opportunity to verify that their front, middle and back office systems are tweaked correctly. And that their counterparties […]

Filed Under: Compliance, Corporate Actions, Funds, Infastructure, Sec Lending, Settlement, Slider, Standards, Trading, Uncategorized Tagged With: Collateral, Compliance, Corporate Actions, DTCC, Fund Ops, Matching, Middle Office Ops, Ops Risk, Post Trade, SEC, Settlement, Standards, T+2

EU Benchmarks: Time to Take Inventory

July 13, 2017 By Chris Kentouris Leave a Comment

Some middle office and compliance managers will soon have their work cut out for them creating a benchmark inventory management process to show European regulators that they use approved benchmarks. Effective January 1, 2018, the European Benchmark Regulation (BMR) will require that European Union-supervised entities who want to enter into financial contracts or instruments referencing […]

Filed Under: Compliance, Data, Derivatives, Funds, Investments, Investors, Post-Trade, Rules, Slider, Trading Tagged With: Brokerage Ops, Compliance, Derivatives, ESMA, Fund Ops, Investment Ops, Middle Office Ops, MiFID, Regulators, Reporting, Standards, Swaps

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