Securities Industry News articles from January 2002

Securities Industry News archives from January 2002

BNY's Clearing Buy: The Big Get Bigger.(BNY Clearing acquires Weiss, Peck and Greer)(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... The new year is starting with one less midsize correspondent clearing firm, following BNY Clearing Service Llc's announcement Thursday that it is acquiring Weiss, Peck & Greer Llc's correspondent clearing business. Last year saw two...

Island scores points: ECN bolsters case for exchange status as it tops Instinet's volumes.(electronic communications network)(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... The Island ECN, still lumbering on the tortuous road to becoming an exchange, has scored significant points toward that goal by unseating Instinet late last year as the electronic communications network with the largest share of Nasdaq trade,...

T+3 in India: Regulator slates April for shortened settlement.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... Continuing to reform India's securities processing infrastructure, the country's regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India has set April 1 as the date to shorten the settlement cycle from five days to three. The decision, made by a...

European/U.S. Processing Cost Differential Disputed.(Statistical Data Included)
January 7, 2002... European clearing and settlement costs are not as high as some market observers have suggested, according to a study recently published by a Brussels-based think tank. In fact, the report claims that domestic European clearing and settlement...

Goodbye 2001: RECOVERY and STP TOP 2002 AGENDA.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
January 7, 2002... It was the worst of times and it was the worst of times, a season of darkness and likely the worst year of our lives. Superlatives easily trip over cliches when contemplating 2001, proving inadequate at best. The year unfolded with the...

Despite Spending Squeeze, Security Tops IT Agenda.(information technology)(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
January 7, 2002... Although the red ink from stalled revenue has hit industry IT spending hard-resulting in everything from scrapped tech plans to wholesale layoffs-the perceived need for tighter security may force firms to pump more money into technology...

Canada's TD Moves South To Pursue New Options Biz.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... Continuing a pair of industry trends, Canada's TD Securities took the plunge into the world of equity options market-making through the year-end purchase of a pair of Chicago-based firms: Stafford Trading and the Letco Cos. TD Securities,...

NASD Seeks to Streamline Brokerage Account Transfers.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... One of the areas brokerages are loath to discuss is the habitual lag time it takes to transfer a departing client's account from one firm to another. Although the reasons given by brokerages for the seemingly never-ending delays are that there...

Midby Turns Down CFO Post at OM After Reorg.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... OM's corporate reorganization has claimed at least one senior executive. Niklas Midby, the former EVP and head of the transaction division at OM who had recently accepted a promotion to CFO at the Stockholm-based technology powerhouse and...

Merrill Sells Pricing Unit to Interactive Data.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... Confirming months of market talk, Merrill Lynch last week said it will sell its Securities Pricing Services (SPS) business to Interactive Data Corp. for $48 million in cash. Industry sources said IDC won out over Bloomberg and Blackrock, a...

Den Norske Chosen for Dollar Clearing.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... The Norwegian central depository, VPS, has appointed Den norske Bank to be the U.S.-dollar settlement bank for securities listed in U.S. dollars on the Oslo Bors. Den norske, the country's largest U.S.-dollar clearing agent and custodian...

Best Execution Issue Looms Larger for U.S. Markets.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... Long delayed and implemented without much enthusiasm amid the post-Sept. 11 adjustments, best execution is likely to become one of the hottest issues of 2002 for the highly fragmented and competitive securities industry. New technologies...

FSA to Launch Formal Investigation Into Best Execution in U.K.(Financial Services Authority)(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... The Financial Services Authority (FSA), the U.K. regulator, is extending its investigation into the nature of what constitutes "best execution" by agency brokers on behalf of clients, and how regulated securities firms can achieve common...

Italy Ushers in New Year With Bond Tax Reform.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... Italian tax authorities have rung in the new year with reform that aims to reduce the cumbersome paperwork that local custodian banks and their foreign investors must undergo to receive beneficial tax treatment. As of Jan. 1, investors in...

Mergers, Automation Dominate U.K. Debate.
January 7, 2002... At the end of an eventful year for consolidating Europe's investment infrastructure, the heads of three of the U.K.'s major investment facilities-the London International Financial Futures and Options Exchange, the London Clearing House and...

Hunt for Liquidity Tops Agenda in U.S.(Interview)
January 7, 2002... The securities trading industry faced many tough issues in 2001, a year that will forever be remembered for the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center as well as Wall Street's resilience amid the worst of times. The markets' downturn...

Costs, STP Confront Clearers in 2002.(straight through processing)(Panel Discussion)
January 7, 2002... The correspondent clearing industry arguably just completed its most challenging year ever, like much of the securities industry in general. The market downturn combined with the expensive task of reaching T+1 was bad enough, before the attack...

Buy-Side Technology: Overcoming Legacy Systems to Get to STP, T+1.(Interview)
January 7, 2002... The question many buy-side firms grappled with all year was what to do with the back office: Whether to outsource the accounting, clearing and settlement functions to some service provider, or keep those functions running internally. The answer...

Regulations: Harmonization Needed for Europe's Next Phase.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... The changeover to the euro this January brings a new urgency to the task of harmonizing European securities legislation. Recently, a number of steps have been taken by the authorities and others to move the process along. For example, in...

ECNs & ATSs: After Adding Customers, Liquidity, What's Next?(electronic communications networks, alternative trading systems)(Statistical Data Included)(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... In 2001, the top six ECNs' market share grew to 46.8 percent of Nasdaq share volume in the third quarter compared to 34.5 percent a year earlier, and ECNs went from playing niche roles to center stage as facilities that people couldn't help but...

Standards: XML Pot Boils But FpML, Others Not Yet Served.(Document markup language, Financial products Markup Language,)(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... The XML brew that has been simmering on the industry's front burner for the last year is going to be brought to a boil in 2002, stoked by convergence and new XML standards. RIXML, MDDL, ebXML-not to mention XML-enabled versions of FIX and the...

Brokerage Technology: Rethinking IT Priorities in a Tough Economy.(Interview)
January 7, 2002... Charles Schwab, Merrill Lynch, Ameritrade, Credit Suisse First Boston and Morgan Stanley all announced plans to lay off employees this year. As the stock market turned south and companies stopped going public, Wall Street revenue was hit...

Straight-Through Processing: T+1 in 2005 is Doable, Says Merrill's Thomas.(time to settlement standard, Arthur Thomas, chairman of Merrill Lynch Securities Services)(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... The U.S. dramatically improved its post-trade infrastructure in 1995 when it cut its settlement cycle to three days from five, but a mere five years later reducing operations risk and processing efficiency once again topped the industry agenda....

FinTrack Uses FpML for Messages.(Financial products Markup Language)(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... FinTrack Systems recently incorporated the Financial products Markup Language (FpML) for inter- and intra-company messaging, as part of the New York City-based software developer's PriceTrack real-time price-distribution system for...

South Africa Completes Dematerialization.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... South Africa's equities market marked its final lap in dematerialization last Wednesday, with all 636 shares now settled in book-entry form. With the move, however, came a sharp increase in processing fees: from R4 (33 cents) per trade per...

Island Eyes Move to Cincinnati Exchange.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... The Island ECN is in discussions with the Cincinnati Stock Exchange about reporting its Nasdaq trades there, following the exchange's implementation of a new pricing plan for Nasdaq stocks in late November aimed at attracting business from...

A.B. Watley Raises $6.3M in Equity.(Brief Article)
January 7, 2002... A.B. Watley Group has raised $6.3 million through a private placement of convertible preferred stock with institutional investors. The firm will use the proceeds for working capital for both parts of its business-a brokerage arm and a...

J.P. Morgan Chase Leaves Clearstream for Euroclear.
January 14, 2002... In a blow to Clearstream's vision of a vertical model for securities processing, J.P. Morgan Chase last Thursday confirmed that it will shift billions worth of euros in business to rival international depository Euroclear and that its head of...

Utility or Not?(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... While much debate on the future of securities processing has drawn the distinction between vertical or horizontal integration, both a mutually-owned utility and privately-owned company face the rigors of market competition, Andre Roelants, CEO...

Advent Sues Javelin Again.
January 14, 2002... The second lawsuit filed by San Francisco-based Advent Software against Javelin Technologies in December is the latest turn in a nearly three-year-long relationship, one that started with Advent's investment in the New York City-based FIX...

Nasdaq Gets SIP Bids; OM Wins ADF.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... The bidding to build a new securities information processor (SIP) for Nasdaq stocks-an important step in the Nasdaq Stock Market's bid to become an exchange-ended on Jan. 7, with fewer than 10 proposals being submitted, Adena Friedman, SVP of...

Lava's Inroads Underscore Montage's Impact.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... Judging by the success of Lava Trading, a young financial software firm that made substantial inroads last year, Wall Street is increasingly espousing the concept of a montage as the answer to market fragmentation, potentially spelling doom for...

SEC's Nazareth: Moving Markets Beyond Sept. 11.(Annette L. Nazareth of the Securities and Exchange Commission)
January 14, 2002... Annette L. Nazareth, director of the Division of Market Regulation for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, in remarks made last week in New York City at the Bond Market Association's legal and compliance conference, detailed the steps...

Clearstream Expands in Asia-Pacific.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... In a move that seems to be a case of bad timing all around, Clearstream International last week announced that it has expanded its reach into Asia-Pacific, implementing two newly automated connections to the People's Republic of China and the...

BBH, BNP Paribas Grow U.K. Custody Businesses.(Brown Brothers Harriman)(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... The competitive London securities processing market just got a little more crowded, with Brown Brothers Harriman and BNP Paribas both announcing big changes last week. David Bilbe, managing director of State Street's securities services...

NYFIX Restructures, Seeks Additional Investments.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... NYFIX, which raised $60 million last year in a secondary public offering, is looking to make acquisitions and investments in companies in the software and infrastructure for the order routing and electronic order flow space, and is gearing up...

Cantor Responds to Dow Jones Market Data Suit.(Cantor Fitzgerald)(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... Cantor Fitzgerald last week filed a motion to dismiss a suit by Dow Jones against Cantor and its affiliate, Market Data Corp. (MDC). Cantor had filed a countersuit a few days earlier. The suits are related to Dow Jones' former ownership of...

Virt-x Extends Reach With GlobalTopic.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... Virt-x, the all-electronic stock exchange specializing in European blue-chip stocks, is seeking to widen its user base by providing direct access from independent screen vendors. Last week, it announced it has established a network connection...

Singapore Market Looks to Consolidate Platforms.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... Continuing its straight-through-processing efforts, the Singapore Exchange last week said it will issue a request for information to third-party vendors to explore consolidating its operating systems. "The feasibility study is being carried...

Equilend Begins Testing With Consortium Members.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... Equilend, an Internet-based securities lending platform, has begun live testing. The tests are expected to lead to a full rollout of the stock lending service later this year. Equilend, owned by a consortium of major investment banks, has...

Firms Pursuing STP; Some Unsure of T+1, Survey Says.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... Most securities firms are moving ahead full speed with their straight-through-processing initiatives, even though the industry deadline to move to trade-date-plus-one-day settlement has been extended to 2005, according to a survey conducted by...

Delayed by 9/11, Brut Rolls Out.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... The Brut ECN is rolling out a new front end designed to target the buy side that was developed with TheBeast, after a delay following the attack on the World Trade Center. TheBeast's office, where the front end was hosted, was located in the...

For the Record.
January 14, 2002... The story "XML Pot Boils But FpML, Others Not Served," in Securities Industry News, Jan. 7, mistakenly referred to the combination of the investment-based standard RIXML and IRML. A representative of RIXML points out that the two organizations...

OneChicago Teams With CBOEdirect; NQLX Taps BOTCC.
January 14, 2002... OneChicago last week selected CBOEdirect, the screen-based trading system of the Chicago Board Options Exchange, as its matching engine to trade single-stock futures and narrow-based equity index futures contracts. OneChicago, a joint...

PA Consulting Signs Up With axion4gstp.
January 14, 2002... London-based PA Consulting has become the latest to sign up as an axion4gstp partner to help companies integrate their systems with the Global Straight-Through-Processing Association's Transaction Flow Manager model for STP. The TFM-one of...

FIX Protocol Ltd. Members Join TransactTools Board.
January 14, 2002... TransactTools, a New York City-based FIX vendor, has added two influential figures to its advisory board from the securities industry and FIX Protocol Ltd. Jim Leman, managing director of global equity connectivity and the equity global middle...

Oslo Takes Over Copenhagen.
January 14, 2002... The Oslo Bors is slowly taking over management of back-office systems for the neighboring Copenhagen Stock Exchange as part of a cooperation agreement on joint development of new technology signed last April. In mid-December, the Norwegian...

SmartStream Enters Intraday Reconciliation, ETC Marts.
January 14, 2002... London-based SmartStream Technologies earlier this month introduced a new module to its software package, SmartStream Reconciliations, which allows financial firms to predict cash balances on a real-time basis without waiting for end-of day...

State Street Invests In Aggregator Firm.
January 14, 2002... Boston-based State Street Corp. has acquired a minority interest in ByAllAccounts, an account aggregation and portfolio analysis solutions provider, the bank announced last week. State Street will integrate ByAll- Accounts' WebPortfolio product...

Indata to Preview New CRM Product.
January 14, 2002... Indata has added a customer relationship management (CRM) capability to its Investment Management System for Windows suite of products, which provide trade order management, portfolio accounting, performance measurement, compliance, client...

Functionality Boost Key to Tibco-Talarian Deal.
January 14, 2002... Tibco Software's planned acquisition of Talarian will allow the larger and more diversified vendor to provide additional functionality in its messaging infrastructure offerings. Tibco, which plans to acquire Talarian in a stock and cash...

CitiStreet buys SunGard's Benefit Biz in Australia.
January 14, 2002... CitiStreet, a jointly owned subsidiary of State Street Corp., and Citigroup will buy the back-office administration business of SunGard Employee Benefit Systems (Sebs) in Australia, marking CitiStreet's first expansion overseas. The...

Primex System Adds S&P 100.(Brief Article)
January 14, 2002... Nasdaq's Primex Auction System last week added S&P 100 Index stocks to the list of securities eligible to trade on the system. Primex went live Dec. 17 with the Dow 30 stocks. Nasdaq plans to add Nasdaq 100 stocks on Jan. 22. During the...

Trace Group to Discuss Fees, Liquidity Impact.
January 14, 2002... The NASD within the next month will convene the first meeting of the Bond Trade Reporting Committee (BRTC), a joint group that the NASD agreed to establish with the Bond Market Association (BMA). The group will assess the impact of...

U.k. Technology Spending Seen Sliding Over Next Year.
January 14, 2002... Technology spending among major U.K. securities firms and banks is expected to fall in 2002, reflecting the downturn in market volumes and business confidence, according to a survey conducted by the Confederation of U.K. Industry and...

Advest Joins Correspondent Ranks.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Advest expected to convert from self-clearing to clearing its securities activity through New York City-based Wexford Clearing Services Corp. over the past weekend, joining a wave of other brokerages that have decided the benefits of...

Regs Weigh Changes In Bond Processing.
January 21, 2002... The Federal Reserve and the Securities and Exchange Commission are deciding what to do about the vulnerabilities presented by the concentration of clearing banks in the bond markets revealed in settlement problems stemming from Sept. 11....

SIA T+1 Update: DTCC's new settlement model, timetables unveiled.
January 21, 2002... The Depository Trust & Clearing Corp.'s new settlement model as well as timetables for the two rival central matching services topped the agenda at the Securities Industry Association's T+1 conference last Wednesday. Contrary to initial...

Instinet: Down But Not Out.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Instinet had long been wary of the montagethe composite electronic display that takes the mystery out of a fragmented marketplaceand fought hard to bring about nine amendments to Nasdaq's original SuperMontage proposal in the name of a level...

EFA Software Sells Out to Canadian E-Com Firm.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Calgary, Canada-based EFA Software, a privately-held trading and depository systems software vendor, has been bought by Basis100, a Canadian e-commerce technology company, in a combined cash-and-stock swap transaction valued at C$35.5 million...

AT PRESS TIME.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Nasdaq Taps Harts Bill Harts, formerly managing director of strategic business development for Salomon Smith Barney's global equity division, has joined Nasdaq as EVP of corporate strategy. In his role at Salomon, he was responsible...

Grid Computing Could Cut Costs, Improve Performance.
January 21, 2002... In a year of trying to do more with less, Wall Street firms are taking a hard look at grid computinga way to spread applications around servers regardless of their locations or the operating systems they run. Today, several technology...

FISD Wants to Link to Other Groups.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... While the goal of XML is to better connect industry participants, the extensible markup language may also help bring together the trade organizations that represent those market players. In what appears to be an increased effort to...

ESF Eyes Expansion, New Management.(The European Securities Forum)(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... The European Securities Forum (ESF) is aiming to expand its membership in Continental Europe, even as it is in the market for a new leader. The ESF, an industry group lobbying for greater consolidation of the European securities processing...

Computershare, Deutsche Borse form Joint Venture.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... In its first foray into Continental Europe, Australian software vendor and global transfer agent Computershare will form a joint venture this spring with the Deutsche Borse to offer shareholder recordkeeping and ancilliary services under the...

SunGard Integrates Bridge.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... The former Bridge retail brokerage market data unit, now called PowerPartner, will provide data for other SunGard Data Systems applications, including BrokerWare and Powerstation. "We want to get the market data into other solutions as fast...

EuroMTS to Spin Off in Germany.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... EuroMTS, the European government bond-trading system, will spin off its MTS German Marketnow a division trading German government and state bondsinto MTS Deutschland, to be majority held by member firms. "We have been witnessing increasing...

As Overall Volumes Sink, Electronic Order Books Grow.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Despite a precipitous fall in overall trading in 2001, the proportion of equity securities transactions conducted via electronic order books increased on European exchanges during 2001, confirming the dominance of the order-driven model for...

On Deck: A Common Currency for Global Exchange Statistics?(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... True comparison of the performance statistics of the world's securities exchanges is almost impossible, given the different ways exchanges record transactions conducted on their markets. The issue of a standard methodology for turnover, market...

SS&C Technologies Buys Out Real-Time USA.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Windsor, Conn.-based SS&C Technologies announced last week that it has acquired the assets and business of Real-Time USA, a supplier of sell-side fixed-income applications. Headquartered in Oakbrook Terrace, Ill., with 28 employees, Real-Time...

Predictive Jettisons Ops To Gov-Friendly Riptech.(Predictive Systems, operations, Riptech Inc.)(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
January 21, 2002... Global Integrity, the unit of New York City-based Predictive Systems that runs the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS/ISAC), set up two years ago to protect the financial industry from computer hacking and virus...

Digital Island Infrastructure to Run on Cognotec System.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Cognotec, the Dublin-based foreign exchange and money-market trading technology provider, is adding Digital Island's two-way trading suite to its Internet transaction platform. Cognotec's clients include B2B FX trading platform Currenex and...

CFTC Approves Norway's NOS Clearing ASA.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... The Commodity Futures Trading Commission last week approved Norway's NOS Clearing ASA as a clearinghouse for over-the-counter derivatives after determining that the Oslo-based utility is under proper control overseas. "It's the second...

OM Expands Outsourcing Deal With Sydney Exchange.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
January 21, 2002... Expanding its reach in Australia, OM has signed an eight-year, $28 million outsourcing deal to run the Sydney Futures Exchange's clearing system and install a new OM-designed depository system. Of the $28 million, $5 million is for license...

Aurora Offers Web-based WinFits for Bond Recovery.(Aurora Software)(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Aurora Software, a fixed-income trading systems developer that targets large portfolios on the sell side, last week began marketing a Web-based version of its WinFits trading platform for use as a disaster-recovery solution for fixed-income...

NASD Rules to Include Markup, Despite Trace.
January 21, 2002... The National Association of Securities Dealers will in days file a reformulated interpretation of acceptable dealer markups and fees on bond trades with the Securities Exchange Commission, following the decision by the NASD Board last month to...

Experts Outline Antitrust Concerns for E-Bond Systems.
January 21, 2002... Harry Robins, senior associate in the antitrust practice of law firm Morgan, Lewis & Brockius, recently provided advice to an audience of mostly compliance and bond-trading executives from Wall Street's largest broker-dealers about what should...

Citigroup Debuts CitiConnect Platform in Asia-Pacific.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Citigroup has rolled out CitiConnect for Securities, its integrated service platform for retail banks and brokers in Asia-Pacific, picking up Fubon Group, one of Taiwan's largest brokerages, as its first customer. The offering-which...

Mellon Nabs Norwich Supermarket Account in U.K.(Mellon Financial, Norwich Union, mutual fund supermarket)(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Mellon Financial's Global Securities Services division last week said it had scored its second win in the United Kingdom's online fund administration business with an agreement to process trades for Norwich Union's fund supermarket. ...

J.P. Morgan Takes TradeWeb Stake.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... J.P. Morgan, the investment banking arm of J.P. Morgan Chase, has taken an equity stake in TradeWeb. The investment comes as industry observers believe the system may merge with Market Axess, another multidealer platform backed by an industry...

Market Voices Support for Revised European ATS Rules.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... Europe's national securities regulators have released their revised proposals for the regulation of alternative trading systems. The new rules are designed to establish a common regulatory regime for ATSs, regardless of which E.U. member-state...

SecFinex Appoints Oddie CEO.(Brief Article)
January 21, 2002... SecFinex, an Internet-delivered trading system for securities lending, has appointed a new CEO and board member, as part of its ambitions to expand operations in the securities lending marketplace. John Oddie has been named as CEO to...

Ax Falls on 167 DTCC Staffers.(Depository Trust and Clearing Corp.)(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
January 28, 2002... In the latest sweep of its cost-cutting ax, Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. has laid off 167 employees, officials confirmed last Thursday. Close to 300 staffers accepted voluntary retirement or severance packages throughout 2001 and nine...

London Markets Reveal Global Ambitions.
January 28, 2002... Both the London Stock Exchange and the London International Financial Futures and Options Exchange see the potential to expand their operations globally, and aren't just setting their sights on European markets. The LSE, which failed in...