Tag: financial markets

S&P report on the Gulf Corporate Governance

By: Nicolas Parasie, The Wall Street Journal According to the latest report by S&P corporate governance among Gulf companies is weak and improving it will be a slow process. Only 2 or 6.3%, of the 32 companies in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region that S&P rates have earned “strong” management and governance points. That […]

ICMA Report on The European Repo Market

The International Capital Market Association (ICMA) has released the results of its latest survey into the state of the European repo market.  Over the years these surveys have mirrored the fluctuations in the repo markets and this 25th survey which represents statistics gathered in June 2013* is no exception. Repo Market Overview Highlighting an overall […]

Boom time for Middle-Eastern payments and transaction processing markets

An article by ACI Worldwide’s EMEA Region general manager, Paul Thomalla, published on Bobsguide.com has highlighted exciting times ahead for the Middle-Eastern payments, technology and transaction processing markets.  ACI Worldwide is predicting that by 2020 the region’s payments volume will have reached $192.3bn and equate to 20% of the total world volume.  At five times […]

Tougher measures on capital requirements proposed by the regulators

By: FT.com Global regulators on Thursday proposed new measures to toughen up the regime that governs capital requirements for banks’ trading books. The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision issued a consultation paper proposing that banks use a standardised approach to determine how much capital they need to hold to cover trading book risks, as a backstop […]

Working together to combat money laundering

7th Annual European Financial Crime Conference On 21st October the European Financial Crime Conference takes place in London.  Key areas to be debated over two days include current thinking on AML compliance and a review of the EU’s AML agenda.  The conference is expected to draw in delegates not just from the UK and EU […]

Clearstream and DCCC Cooperation on Collateral Management for CCP Margining

By: SecuritiesLendingTimes Clearstream’s global liquidity hub has its first Middle Eastern central counterparty (CCP) link. The Dubai Commodities Clearing Corporation (DCCC), which is the CCP of the Dubai Gold & Commodities Exchange, has agreed to cooperate on collateral management for CCP margining. By the end of the first quarter of 2014, Dubai’s exchange customers will be […]

The Libor effect on derivatives

The UK Court of Appeal is this week hearing two cases in an attempt to determine whether the Libor rate rigging scandal can be considered to be sufficient grounds for invalidating derivatives contracts.  In the first of the cases Barclays attempts to overturn a previous judgement which would see it having to defend in court […]

Investment Performance Challenges

Gauging exchange-traded fund managed portfolios Morningstar’s EFT Investment conference saw an interesting panel discussion on the difficulties of gauging the performance of exchange-traded fund managed portfolios. The panel noted investor concerns with regard to these investments which were driven by two prime considerations; the lack of transparency in viewing results and an uncertainty over the […]

Banking Reform Bill Amendment on Payments and Securities Settlements

On 8th October the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Bill heads to the House of Lords for further consideration by their Lordships. Having listened to numerous opinions the Government has tabled more than 80 amendments which it proposes to add to The Bill. One such amendment relates to payments and securities settlements.  This amendment, set out […]

Technologies required to improve (ORM) Operational Risk Management

Thompson Reuters published an interesting report available on Risklibrary.net discussing the specific technologies required for firms to improve their ORM processes, including ORM platforms, policy and procedure management, regulatory change management, and real-time risk intelligence. Defining ORM scope Operational risk is defined as “the risk of loss resulting from inadequate or failed internal processes, people and […]