Securities Industry News articles from March 2008

Securities Industry News archives from March 2008

Nasdaq Makes Tick-Data Play.
March 3, 2008... Literally bringing the electronic stock market to desktop computers, Nasdaq Stock Market has introduced a tool that gives traders and compliance officers nearly immediate access to detailed quote activity, allowing them to develop trading...

Saying Good-bye to Legacy Systems~Sunsetting applications can be a hard sell for IT groups.
March 3, 2008... Ask an information technology expert at a large investment bank if he has a certain piece of software or hardware and you will likely hear that the bank has at least one of everything. At banks that have grown through acquisitions, that can...

Long Wait for Official SEC Guidance On NMS Exemptions Raises Concerns.
March 3, 2008... The Securities and Exchange Commission is expected to soon consider issuing long-awaited guidance on market structure issues related to Regulation National Market System (NMS) that have left brokerages' compliance officers unsettled since last...

Canada Stepping Out of U.S. Shadow~New ATSs likely to bring market fragmentation, opportunities.
March 3, 2008... Long overshadowed by that of its southern neighbor, the Canadian securities market is beginning to claim a share of the North American limelight, according to industry analysts, broker-dealers and technology providers. Over the past 12...

ISE, Osaka Exchange To Develop Options Platform.
March 3, 2008... The International Securities Exchange (ISE) and Osaka Securities Exchange (OSE) said last week that they had signed a memorandum of agreement to create a jointly owned options trading platform in Japan. A timeline for the project will be...

NYSE Buys MCX Stake.(Company overview)
March 3, 2008... NYSE Euronext has agreed to pay 2.4 billion rupees ($60 million) for a 5 percent stake in the Multi Commodity Exchange of India (MCX), the country's largest commodity exchange, the companies announced on Feb. 15. The deal is expected to close...

Turquoise Taps BT.
March 3, 2008... Turquoise, a U.K. multilateral trading facility (MTF) backed by nine global banks, continues to prepare for its anticipated launch in September, announcing last week that it has selected BT Group's financial extranet operator BT Radianz to...

People in the News.
March 3, 2008... Kx Systems, a supplier of high-performance database and event processing technology, has shuffled its senior management. President and COO Janet Lustgarten has been named chief executive, while CEO Arthur Whitney has shifted to the president...

CEP Moving Into the Mainstream.(complex event processing)
March 3, 2008... Complex event processing (CEP) technology is powering a new generation of applications that enable companies to make faster, better decisions and execute in a more timely and effective manner. CEP software analyzes rapidly changing data about...

Orc Speeds Up Derivatives Trading.
March 3, 2008... As global derivatives markets become more connected and the velocity of trading increases, "buy- and sell-side firms will require trading systems that can manage the complexities of both market structure and the instruments being traded," says...

Liffe, SuperDerivatives Link Is a Sign of Convergence~Companies say connection will increase liquidity, bring greater derivatives transparency.
March 3, 2008... NYSE Euronext derivatives subsidiary Euronext.liffe announced that it is offering customers of SuperDerivatives, a leading provider of options pricing and benchmarking systems, direct access to the Liffe Connect platform to trade Euronext.liffe...

Reuters: MiFID Is Fragmenting Trade Reporting.
March 3, 2008... Markit Boat, a London-based trade reporting platform owned by Markit Group, has made "substantial inroads" in the publication of European equity trades, according to Reuters, which last week released its first figures since the introduction of...

Dark Books Show Little Sign of Slowing.
March 3, 2008... At a time when transparency is increasingly valued by market participants and regulators alike, "dark pools would seem to be anathema," said Erik Sirri, director of the Securities and Exchange Commission's division of trading and markets. ...

BSA Filing Relief May Be on the Way~GAO report finds value in currency transaction reports, but also operational concerns.(United States. Government Accountability Office)(Bank Secrecy Act)
March 3, 2008... Currency transaction reports (CTRs) have received a restrained vote of confidence from law enforcement agencies in a U.S. General Accountability Office (GAO) report on the value of the filings, which are required under the Bank Secrecy Act...

U.S. Hedge Funds Face Foreign AML Mandates ~FinCEN rules may be in limbo, but overseas regulators are having a say.
March 3, 2008... Though anti-money-laundering (AML) regulations for hedge funds have stalled at the proposal stage in the U.S., funds opening branches abroad can find themselves exposed to other regions' rules. Gary Sutton, the U.S. Treasury Department's...

Cross-border Wire Reporting: One Step Forward ... ~FinCEN readies cost-benefit analysis; implementation plans, standards up in the air.(United States. Financial Crimes Enforcement Network)
March 3, 2008... The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), the U.S. Treasury's anti-money-laundering (AML) arm, plans to deliver this spring a cost-benefit analysis on a long-simmering initiative requiring that cross-border wire transfers be reported...

Turquoise's Lederman: We're Playing to Win.
March 10, 2008... More than a year since its formation, Turquoise is gearing up to play in a European equities landscape that is undergoing rapid transformation under the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID), which went into effect late last year....

Nasdaq Beats SEC to Punch On Compression.
March 10, 2008... The National Securities Clearing Corp.'s (NSCC) proposal to eliminate trade compression has not yet been approved by the Securities and Exchange Commission, but the Nasdaq Stock Market is not waiting for the regulator to take action. ...

U.S. Options Industry Marching Toward 21-Character Symbols.
March 10, 2008... As the U.S. options industry braces for a nomenclature overhaul, the Options Clearing Corp. (OCC), exchanges, member firms and service providers are starting the laborious process of adapting their internal applications to conform to a...

Top Correspondent Clearers Taking On the Vendors~New technology solutions aim to service brokers' broader needs.
March 10, 2008... In search of added revenue, the largest correspondent clearing firms are working to extend their technology know-how across their clients' broader businesses, and potentially become a consulting and technology source for non-clearing customers...

When Disaster Strikes: Infrastructure Issues Spurring New Approaches to Outsourcing.
March 10, 2008... So far this year, a record-breaking snowstorm left much of China without power and two severed undersea cables took India off the Internet. Neither of these incidents made securities firms with outsourced operations particularly confident, and...

Valuation Risk Service In Place, Reuters Seeks Community~Open pricing strategy for hard-to-value instruments aims to bring market transparency.
March 10, 2008... Acting on the belief that a key reason for the current credit crunch is the lack of credible valuation methods for complicated instruments, Reuters launched a bespoke valuation service for derivatives and complex securities. Now it is looking...

SuperDerivatives: Transparency Is About Accurate Pricing.
March 10, 2008... Though it was not a new product, SuperDerivatives noticed a decidedly heightened interest in its SD-Revaluation service during last summer's credit crunch. "This is really where we saw clients come to us for a very real-time solution--same day...

Aleri Adds Visualization Tools to Liquidity Analytics.(Lab49)
March 10, 2008... Aleri, a Chicago-based provider of complex event processing (CEP) technology, has partnered with consultancy Lab49 on a set of tools to help traders consolidate, analyze and visualize market data in real time. The new tools are based on...

Institutions Boost Options.
March 10, 2008... Institutional demand for options trading and a regulatory overhaul are "rocking the marketplace," driving trading volumes to record levels and providing a stronger foundation for the future, according to a report released last month by New...

Market Sentiment Drives Fails.
March 10, 2008... Data released by the Securities and Exchange Commission on borrowed securities with fails-to-deliver in August and September suggests that, though a substantial percentage of the overall stock market, the fails were not driven by parties...

BSE Executive To Join Nyfix.
March 10, 2008... Nyfix, a New York-based provider of electronic trading solutions, has created a position for industry veteran C. Thomas Richardson--global head of transaction services. Richardson is currently EVP of the Boston Stock Exchange, where he is...

People in the News.
March 10, 2008... Corporate actions software provider XSP has named Anthony Scanga business analyst in its operations group. Scanga, who previously led a team of analysts processing global corporate actions at Bank of New York Mellon Corp., will be based in the...

A Virtual Answer to Data Integration~ Information-as-a-service is winning adherents, but some see room for improvement.
March 10, 2008... Business executives need quick access to accurate data to make good trading, risk management and compliance decisions; information technology executives want to lower their costs and improve operational efficiency. Neither set of goals is...

Data Across the Enterprise: Pursuit of the Unobstructed View~Panel of experts lament lack of standardized formats, stress quick access.(Discussion)
March 10, 2008... Rising trading volumes, regulatory pressures and recent well-publicized operational and valuation fiascos are pushing financial institutions to gain a better understanding of their data. Because faulty information can flow through a multitude...

Avoiding the Human Integrator~Armanta communicates between silos, gives fund managers data manipulation tools.
March 10, 2008... At large fund management firms, the burden of integrating computer systems, data flows and applications often falls on the portfolio manager. Morristown, N.J.-based Armanta aims to change that through a combination of applications and a...

DataSynapse Partners With Integration Vendor Informatica.
March 10, 2008... DataSynapse is pairing its grid computing technology with Informatica Corp.'s data integration capabilities, resulting in cost-effective solutions for tasks such as identity monitoring for anti-money laundering (AML), risk data aggregation and...

Sovereign Wealth Risk.
March 10, 2008... On Feb. 27, the day the European Commission said that sovereign wealth funds should adopt a voluntary code of conduct, the U.S. Congress announced the creation of a bipartisan task force to examine transparency and accountability issues, among...

ISE, Eurex To Forge Transatlantic Link ~OCC chief executive says more connections could follow.
March 17, 2008... Derivatives exchange Eurex, its International Securities Exchange (ISE) subsidiary and the Options Clearing Corp. (OCC) have unveiled plans to create a transatlantic link that will allow Eurex customers to clear contracts traded on ISE through...

SEC's ADV Changes: Much Ado?
March 17, 2008... The Securities and Exchange Commission's proposed changes to Form ADV, filed by investment advisers when they register with the agency, could improve disclosure of conflicts of interest, but observers say they may not shine as bright a light on...

SEC, CFTC Cooperation Could Push Portfolio Margin's Cross-Asset Goals.
March 17, 2008... The announcement last week that the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) have agreed to work more closely together on overlapping issues may be a boon to brokers' aim to marry futures and securities...

FSA: Traders Must Record Client Order Telephone Conversations.
March 17, 2008... Adding new compliance burdens to financial services firms still getting up to speed with the European Union's Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID), the U.K.'s Financial Services Authority (FSA) will require that they record...

Citadel Solutions, Bloomberg Team on Hedge Fund Platform.
March 17, 2008... Hedge fund administrator Citadel Solutions, an affiliate of Citadel Investment Group, is introducing an integrated hedge fund trading platform for users of Bloomberg AIM, the Bloomberg Professional service's buy-side order management system...

Equity Venues > 55.
March 17, 2008... There are now more than 55 venues in the U.S. equities market, according to a recent report from New York-based Tabb Group. "The popular myth that the markets will centralize again is probably incorrect," said Tabb Group CEO and founder Larry...

New Home for Direct Edge.
March 17, 2008... The Direct Edge electronic communications network (ECN) has opened its new headquarters at 545 Washington Blvd. in Jersey City, N.J. Direct Edge had been operating out of the Jersey City offices of Knight Capital Group, which started the...

Skyler Upgrades C3 Liquidity.(C3 Liquidity Discovery Solution)(Brief article)
March 17, 2008... Skyler Technology, a Concord, Calif.-based provider of low-latency trading solutions to buy- and sell-side firms, has released the first major upgrade of its C3 Liquidity Discovery Solution. In addition to European-specific...

People in the news.
March 17, 2008... Previously Citigroup's director of global compliance, Thomas Rollauer has returned to Deloitte & Touche in New York as a director in its regulatory and capital markets consulting practice. When Rollauer left Deloitte in October 2003 to take the...

Information and Incentives: The Heart of Risk Management.
March 17, 2008... With recent market events and concerns about the valuation of complex financial products drawing increased attention to the industry's risk management practices, Federal Reserve Board governor Randall Kroszner says it is increasingly important...

ISE's Iceberg Orders Show Continuing Shift to Equity Practices~Nasdaq Options Market, ISE receive SEC approval to offer reserve orders.
March 17, 2008... Days after the International Securities Exchange (ISE) received permission to begin offering reserve orders--a common feature in the equities market--the Nasdaq Options Market was approved to offer similar functionality. ISE, the U.S....

Tradeweb Adds Six Dealers to U.S. Dollar Swaps Market.
March 17, 2008... Bond-trading platform Tradeweb said last week that six new global dealers have joined its online U.S. dollar interest rate swaps (IRS) market, bringing the total number of participants to 15. The new dealers--Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs,...

Coral8 Enhances Engine, Says CEP Extending Reach.
March 17, 2008... Data quality monitoring, fraud detection for block-trading venues, and real-time risk management are a few of the ever-growing number of applications that Wall Street is finding for complex event processing (CEP) technology. Coral8 executives...

New Futures Exchange Unveils Name, Launches ISV Program.(Conference notes)
March 17, 2008... The consortium of firms planning to bring a new electronic exchange to the U.S. futures market has revealed the venue's name--the ELX Electronic Liquidity Exchange. The moniker was introduced at the Futures Industry Association's annual...

NYSE Gives Floor a Credit to Provide Liquidity.
March 17, 2008... The NYSE Hybrid Market has begun offering floor brokers a credit for providing liquidity, a signal that it is inching closer to the maker-taker fee model prevalent among execution venues. However, the credit--NYSE's first for the floor--is...

Emphasis on IT Risk Management Driving New Solutions~Survey says some programs inadequate, but sees recognition of need for holistic view.
March 17, 2008... As global financial services firms look to bolster their risk controls to avoid the sort of trading losses recently reported at French bank Societe Generale, a study from Ernst & Young says that many have ineffective or nonexistent information...

Future Bright for Japan's Alternative Trading Venues.
March 17, 2008... Volumes on Japan's alternative trading platforms rose 156 percent last year, driven by demand from both retail and institutional investors drawn by features such as off-hours trading, competitive prices and new trading tools. The...

Swedish Start-up Tbricks Launches Trading Platform.
March 17, 2008... Tbricks, a Stockholm-based start-up, has launched a multi-asset-class trading system for banks, brokerages and hedge funds. The system, dubbed Genesis, is the company's first product and was developed by a team of ex-senior managers from...

A Chinese OTC Market.(over the counter )
March 24, 2008... The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) is planning to develop a national over-the-counter stock exchange, according to the Beijing Times. The OTC market would be established after the launch of a proposed growth enterprise market...

Turquoise Taps NeoNet.
March 24, 2008... Turquoise, the U.K.-based multilateral trading facility expected to launch in September, has agreed to use a system from Stockholm-based technology provider and agency brokerage NeoNet for real-time data from the European equity markets....

New Cline Consultancy.
March 24, 2008... Capital markets expert and former Accenture managing director William Cline has founded Cline Group, a Pawleys Island, S.C.-based consultancy that will focus on capital markets training. In January 2007, Cline started up New York-based...

People in the news.(appointments)
March 24, 2008... Chicago-based Citadel Investment Group has brought on JP Morgan Chase & Co. veteran Patrik Edsparr as CEO of Citadel Europe in London and head of the firm's global fixed-income business, including securitized products. Edsparr, who was a member...

IBM, Platform Team on High-Performance Solution~Symphony for Cell will allow financial firms to consolidate data centers.
March 24, 2008... Major investment banks are looking at hybrid computing as a way to increase their computational speeds for complex structured products while reducing power consumption and space requirements in the data center. One leading solution...

Clearstream Moves to Real-Time Settlement.
March 24, 2008... A decade after first announcing its plans, Luxembourg-based international depository Clearstream International has migrated from continuous batch to real-time settlement. Under real-time settlement, which is increasingly common among...

Software as a Service as a Security Battleground~As on-demand applications proliferate, customers take extra steps to protect their data.
March 24, 2008... Salesforce.com reached a milestone last fall: 1 million people using the online software company to host their customer relationship management systems and other key business processes. Those users were at more than 1,600 financial services...

Perimeters Protected, Firms Look Inward~Focus shifts to internal controls, network monitoring, holistic security.
March 24, 2008... With their perimeters largely secured--though under constant probing for weakness--financial services firms are focusing on internal security by improving controls on what employees can do and enhancing the security of connections for staff and...

Server Virtualization: Powerful Tool, Extra Exposure ~Vendors working to reduce security vulnerabilities of the cost-efficient approach.
March 24, 2008... Dividing a server into multiple virtual machines has brought down firms' purchasing costs and allowed for more efficient use of existing hardware. However, virtualization also poses security risks and challenges, including managing a more...

Bear's Clearing Strengths Attract JP Morgan.(Bear Stearns Companies Inc.)(JPMorgan Chase & Co.)
March 24, 2008... JP Morgan Chase & Co., in a deal backed by the Federal Reserve, agreed last week to purchase faltering Bear Stearns at a discount price. Bear Stearns' correspondent clearing unit, long second fiddle to the firm's high-profile prime brokerage...

BNP Paribas' Big Plans for Dark Pools~Platforms planned in North America, Europe, Hong Kong.
March 24, 2008... BNP Paribas, well known for its global reach and offices in 88 countries, is seeking to add dark liquidity expertise to that reputation--by the end of the year, the French bank aims to have four non-displayed trading platforms in operation...

New Sec-Lending Platform Aims to Give Beneficial Owners Bigger Piece of the Pie~LendEx prepares to launch, lines up central counterparty.
March 24, 2008... A pair of industry heavyweights--former Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Harvey Pitt and LocateStock.com founder and CEO John Tabacco--are backing a new electronic securities lending platform. The system, LendEx, will cater to...

OTC Automation Efforts Pick Up as Regulators Call for Better Processing.
March 24, 2008... Seeking to curtail the credit crunch and prevent such events in the future, the President's Working Group on Financial Markets (PWG) has recommended improving the processing of over-the-counter derivatives. In response, trade groups and...

Regulatory Cooperation Prelude to a Merger Proposal?(United States. Commodity Futures Trading Commission)(United States. Securities and Exchange Commission)
March 24, 2008... Though the recent cooperation agreement signed by the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission will help build a "closer working relationship," according to the regulators, some are calling it a first step. A...

TT Signs Credit Suisse; Plans Link to Tokyo Financial Exchange.(Conference notes)
March 24, 2008... Credit Suisse's prime services unit has entered into a global software licensing agreement with Trading Technologies International (TT), a supplier of trading systems to the derivatives industry. Under the deal, Credit Suisse will make...

Taking the Risk Out of Mutual Fund Compliance.
March 24, 2008... Today, the majority of financial services firms are involved in selling mutual funds, yet very few give any thought to the validity of their data or the technology that is responsible for aiding in the sale or disclosure of these funds. Selling...

SEC Taking Aim At Naked-ShortingBrokerage Clients.
March 31, 2008... Seeking to bolster short-selling regulations, the Securities and Exchange Commission has proposed getting tough on customers who falsely tell their brokers they've located securities to borrow. The proposed Rule 10b-21 addresses so-called...

Spitzer SAR Disclosure an AML Breach.
March 31, 2008... Former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer's fall from power not only provides an example of how well the U.S. anti-money-laundering (AML) regime now works, but may also offer an illustration of how the system can be breached. The event that...

Hard Times for Auction Rate Securities~Liquidity and valuation issues in a tumultuous market.
March 31, 2008... Merrill Lynch & Co., Morgan Stanley and Citigroup were sued by clients last week in separate actions; UBS and its brokerage arm were the target of litigation earlier this month. Those are the tip of the iceberg in a series of legal maneuverings...

Korea Gets First Crossing Network~Instinet, Samsung to roll out alternative trading venue.
March 31, 2008... Samsung Securities Co. and agency brokerage Instinet are announcing today that they will launch Korea's first crossing network, KoreaCross, on April 7. New York-based Instinet will jointly operate KoreaCross, which has received approval...

A Crackdown on High-Volume Traders~SEC tightening reins on unregulated trading firms.
March 31, 2008... In a move that could affect revenues in a resilient and growing segment of the trading community, the Securities and Exchange Commission recently shut down an unregulated trading firm and reportedly is looking at others with similar operational...

RBC Capital Markets Taps Patsystems for Risk.
March 31, 2008... RBC Capital Markets' futures unit has chosen Patsystems' risk management system for all its exchange-traded futures and options contracts, the Chicago-based derivatives trading technology vendor said earlier this month. Patsystems, which...

Cloudy Clearing Cooperation.(LCH.Clearnet Group Ltd.)
March 31, 2008... In a step forward for the European code of conduct that aims to generate competition among the continent's exchange clearers, LCH.Clearnet recently agreed--again--to provide free access to London Stock Exchange (LSE) data to SIS x-clear, the...

CodeStreet's Latency Tools.(Brief article)
March 31, 2008... CodeStreet, a New York-based provider of sales and trading applications and infrastructure solutions, has added latency monitoring and auditing facilities to its suite of market data tools. Market Data Works users will now be able to monitor...

Departure for Radical.
March 31, 2008... After three years at Citigroup, financial technology veteran Jeremy Lehman has struck off on his own, forming Radical Analytics. While investment banks have an array of sophisticated trading systems, Lehman points to the approach of a company...

The Case for Quality Data.
March 31, 2008... Though data management experts regularly cite the importance of clean data, quantitatively measuring the effects that faulty data can have on an enterprise is another matter entirely. Creating a clear-cut analysis of the ramifications of...

Building Regulatory Networks.(United States. Commodity Futures Trading Commission)(United States. Securities and Exchange Commission)
March 31, 2008... Two days after the Securities and Exchange Commission signed an agreement with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to work more closely on areas of overlapping interest, Walter Lukken, acting chairman of the CFTC, was stressing the...

Tullett Picks T-Zero for Post-trade Processing.
March 31, 2008... London-based interdealer brokerage Tullett Prebon has selected T-Zero's trade affirmation platform for straight-through processing (STP) of credit derivatives. In adopting the T-Zero platform, Tullett follows interdealer brokers...

Bridging the Client Data, Telecommunications Gap~For Microsoft, new platform marks expansion into institutional finance.
March 31, 2008... Aiming to provide better service to institutional clients, Microsoft Corp. has teamed with several partners, including trading turret provider IPC Systems, to integrate Microsoft-compatible communication tools and customer relationship...

Merrill Extends Microsoft Workflow Technology.
March 31, 2008... In the never-ending quest to bring applications to market quickly and without high-end programmers slicing into profit margins, Kumar Vadaparty, Merrill Lynch & Co.'s director of global wealth management technology, took on Microsoft Corp.'s...

Goldman Adds QSG to Hudson Street Platform.
March 31, 2008... Quantitative Services Group (QSG), a provider of consulting services and equity analytics, has entered into a partnership with Goldman Sachs' Hudson Street Services business. Institutional clients of Goldman Sachs will now have access to QSG's...

TFA Adds Last Piece of Paperless Platform~Advisory firm adding e-signature functionality to paperwork automation system.(Transamerica Financial Advisors)
March 31, 2008... Transamerica Financial Advisors (TFA) is offering its brokers and advisers the tools to create a completely electronic office, from signing documents to managing them through the approval process. But while the TFA Synergy platform--possibly...

Alphacet Readies an STP Solution for Quants.
March 31, 2008... Stamford, Conn.-based start-up Alphacet is aiming to launch in the second quarter its flagship product, a stand-alone solution for high-speed quantitative strategy development and deployment. Alphacet, which just completed an initial round...