23 – 29 MAY 2013
TECHNOLOGY
TMX Atrium to provide 24/7 client support
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MX Atrium wants to add 24/7 client support to its cadre of services, according to Emmanuel Carjat, managing director. The addition of the service would expand it outside Russia where the service was required by clients, Carjat said in an interview. The vendor started offering hands-on support round-theclock in the former Soviet country because of a lack of Equinix data centers, a challenge TMX Atrium hasn’t met in the past, Carjat explained. This has forced the company to provide the support on-site, he added. TMX Atrium is now considering ‘productizing’ the service as it looks at other developing markets to bring its expertise to, Carjat said. Among the regions the vendor is most interested in are Asia-Pacific, and Eastern and Southern Europe, he added. “We’re seeing significant demand [in those regions],” said Carjat. The vendor is also looking at how to bridge the cultural divide between Russia and the rest of the globe due to interest from non-Russian clients looking for access to the country’s exchanges and Russian clients wanting access to the US, he added. The barriers are not limited to language and regulations, Carjat said. To illustrate his point, he used the Moscow Exchange, which is located in the same building as the successor to the KGB, as an example. Because it is a government building, for-
eigners are only allowed on the premises during normal business hours, nine to five, prohibiting them from being at the exchange before or after trading hours, a situation Carjat said was a first in his experience. Another hurdle to providing service in the country is the lack of transparency among Russian firms, Carjat explained. Due to Russia’s highly secretive nature, local firms are reluctant to disclose infrastructure and other business-related details routinely offered up by Western firms to facilitate implementations, Carjat said. “It’s an education on both sides,” he added.”
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management by the end of the year, with 69% saying regulation was the main reason, Smyth shared. “Firms need to invest in data management,” Smyth said. “Firms that don’t invest in data quality will be at a significant disadvantage, and it will be hard to catch up.” Smyth said firms are starting to see technology as a way to differentiate their business and invest more money to satisfy clients beginning to expect more transparency. MoneyMate plans to launch several offerings to satisfy customer needs, including a discovery tool that can automatically configure and normalize different data sources, Smyth said. The vendor is also working on a platform requiring multiple layers of approvals for data changes within funds’ proprietary systems, he added. Both are expected to go live later this year.
EXCHANGES & ATSs
CME starts work on bonds with BM&FBovespa
The CME Group has started its work with BM&FBovespa to add bonds to the PUMA Trading System as part of the partnership between the two, according to Ari Studnitzer, managing director of Enterprise Architecture at CME. The first phase of the trading system was launched in 2011 for listed derivatives and the two companies recently completed the implementation of the second phase to roll out equities and equity derivatives just a month ago. In order to add bond trading to PUMA, Studnitzer said CME has started working with BM&FBovespa
and its customers to determine how to optimize the platform for the current market environment. “This isn’t just about delivering technology; this is about supporting the customers’ desires and their vision for market structure,” he said. “Once we have a good handle on what the customers want and how the market structure is evolving, we can deliver technology that will support that.” He noted the bond market will be more complex in terms of market structure challenges and the competitive landscape in the country. CME took a similar tack when developing the system for derivatives and equities, Studnitzer said, noting, as an example, that customer trading systems can now interact with consolidated order entry and market data interfaces for all segments of BM&FBovespa using PUMA.