Concerned about potential regulatory fines and skyrocketing costs, the world’s largest banks are turning to artificial intelligence to improve their compliance with know-your-customer and anti-money laundering regulations. “The value proposition for AI solutions is highest for large banks with significant volumes, complexity, multiple lines of business and geographical reach as these banks are affected most […]
Fund Managers Outsource More Mid-Office Ops
Gone are the days when the middle office is maligned as being strictly a cost-center dragging down investment performance. Today more fund managers are concluding that more effective management of their middle office can not only reduce operating expenses, but also give them a competitive edge with investors and keep regulators at bay. Fund management […]
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 […]
RIAs: Hail to the Chief Valuation Officer?
Chief valuation officers could become just as important as chief compliance officers for registered investment fund managers. They also might discover that, like chief compliance officers, the position may carry personal risk of bruising regulatory penalties. The emergence of this new C-class executive was predicted by panelists at a recent global fund valuation forum co-hosted in New […]
T. Rowe Price Investor Payback: The Unpushed Button
For fund managers, proxy voting isn’t a minor housekeeping matter. Depending on just how financially controversial the corporate agenda is, the vote can be as crucial to the health of investor portfolios as any trading decision. There is plenty of regulatory rulemaking to keep everyone’s eye on the ball so when something goes awry, it’s big […]
New US AML Rules: Tough Enough to Catch the Bad Guys?
The US Treasury’s new rules on how financial firms must handle their responsibilities to know their customers and prevent money-laundering will be operationally challenging to follow, but perhaps not entirely effective in identifying the bad guys. The most controversial aspect of the new requirements — finding out the identities of the beneficial owners of the customers […]
Bloomberg Tries Hand at Legal Entity Identifiers (Updated)
That redheaded girl lyna perez nude (Editor’s Note: This article has been updated to reflect additional information received after its initial publication). Does the financial market really need another New York City-based organization issuing legal entity identifiers (LEIs)? How Bloomberg intends to compete with established providers like the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC), London […]
Research Payments in Europe: Can CSAs Survive?
Asset managers of European funds may be breathing a sigh of relief thinking that European regulators will allow them to keep their commission sharing agreements (CSAs) to pay for research they use to make investment decisions for their clients. The reality is not so simple. As currently implemented, the CSAs may not comply with all […]
DOL’s New Fiduciary Standard: Devil in the Word
What does it take to be a fiduciary to a retirement plan for the first time? Broker-dealers and other investment advisors that give clients of retirement plans recommendations on what assets to buy and sell will be struggling to answer this question as they create policies and procedures to fulfill the new fiduciary standard of […]