Brian Bollen's Blog

Excellent sausage rolls

Discovered almost by accident. Wrapping a Linda McCartney vegetarian sausage in Aldi's puff pastry and cooking for 25 mins delivers a top-notch sausage roll. Much better than 'real' ones.

Fiserv joins forces with AFS

Fiserv Inc says it has entered into a partnership that will bring the commercial lending capabilities of Automated Financial Systems (AFS) to Fiserv bank core account processing clients.

Buy-side needs more integration (to the tune of Another Brick in the Wall...)

As global equity markets become more complex, buy-side traders are expressing a strong desire for integrated systems for order and execution management.

Brutus was an honourable man

Mint – Blain’s Morning Porridge

But Brutus says he was ambitious, and, sure, he is an honourable man…

MUFG Investor Services appoints Daniel Trentacosta

MUFG Investor Services, the global asset servicing arm of Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, has appointed Daniel Trentacosta as sales director.

State Street revenue drops but mood upbeat

State Street has reported a drop in total revenue in the first quarter of the year, but Joseph L Hooley, chairman and chief executive officer, remains characteristically upbeat.

London should drive cyber risk insurance

The London insurance-linked securities (ILS) market is perfectly positioned to become the global centre for cyber risk insurance, according to a new report from BNY Mellon, Insurance Linked Securities - Cyber Risk, Insurers and the Capital Markets (ILS represents the transfer of insurance risk to the capital markets, in the form of collateralised reinsurance and other structures).

UK growth slows on Brexit fears

UK economic growth has slowed down on fears that Britain might leave the European Union, says Azad Zangana, senior European economist at Schroders.

Hargreaves Lansdown goes live with Calastone Settlement

Calastone, the global funds transaction network, says that Hargreaves Lansdown has gone live with Calastone Settlements, its funds settlement solution.

LSEG claims strong first quarter

The London Stock Exchange group is reporting what it describes as a strong performance in the first quarter of the year, with all main business divisions delivering growth on an organic and constant currency basis. Total income from continuing operations rose 9% to £387.6m.

Updating the world at large on the merger with Deutsche Börse announced in March 2016, the LSE says that shareholder documents are currently being prepared.

The sale of Russell Investment Management, for gross proceeds of $1.15bn, is on track to complete in Q2 2016, it says.

Axioma expands Asia footprint

Axioma, a provider of risk management and portfolio construction solutions to financial institutions, has launched a Japan office with Kiichi Takai as senior consultant for its multi-asset class risk division.

Onwards and upgrades

Nomura Research Institute (NRI) has begun the next phase of its I-STAR suite upgrades in preparation for the shortened settlement cycle of Japanese Government Bonds(JGB) to T+1 set by the Japan Securities Dealers Association (JSDA) Working Group and scheduled for early 2018.

Ben Pielow named sales director at SmartStream

SmartStream Technologies, the Transaction Lifecycle Management (TLM) specialist, has appointed Ben Pielow as sales director for the UK and Ireland. His focus will be to provide the TLM and SmartStream Reference Data Utility (RDU) suite of solutions to clients in the UK and Ireland.

Pielow will be located in London and will report directly to Claudia Thurner, head of sales, Europe; he has seven years experience in financial technology and software and joined SmartStream from Duco where he was business development manager and was instrumental in the growth of the company. Before that he was at Think Investment Solutions (TIS) where, as a start-up in 2010, he helped launch and grow the business twofold.

More risk needed

Research from State Street conducted with 400 pension professionals from around the world finds that 36 per cent believe the institutions they work for have funding issues that require them to seek higher risk strategies that offer potentially stronger returns.

Doublethink

Mint – Blain’s Morning Porridge

Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them..

SimCorp appoints Thorvaldur Flemming Jensen ASP head

SimCorp, a provider of investment management solutions and services for the global financial services industry, says it has appointed Thorvaldur Flemming Jensen head of its Application Service Provider (ASP) Division and member of the company’s executive management team, reporting directly to the CEO.

Macroeconomic threats on the rise

An economic slowdown in Asia was listed by 22% of respondents of a recent survey conducted by The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) as the biggest systemic risk to the broader economy – a dramatic change from just one year ago when only 1% of respondents ranked an economic downturn outside of the EU/US as the biggest risk.

Winterflood Securities appoints BNY Mellon

BNY Mellon has been appointed by Winterflood Securities to provide US DTCC (US Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation) and Canadian securities clearing and custody services.

BNY Mellon Broker-Dealer Services will provide clearing and settlement services, operating as a direct participant in the US and through a single sub-custodian in Canada. BNY Mellon says that Winterflood Securities will benefit from its enhanced clearing solution, which permits earlier transmission of client orders to the North American market, allowing for realignment of collateral should it be required.

Simon Rafferty, chief operating officer at Winterflood Securities, said: "BNY Mellon impressed us with its experience and knowledge of the North American securities market and its prominence as a leading custody and clearing provider was an important factor in our decision. BNY Mellon is able to provide us with a solution tailored to our specific trading requirements that allows us to deliver timely, high quality services to our clients."

Brave men knocking on our door

Mint – Blain’s Morning Porridge

These are brave men knocking on our door. Let’s go kill them!

I had to giggle when I opened the Financial Times on the train this morning to the news the European Central Bank (ECB) has finally woken up and is having “second thoughts” about contingent convertible (CoCo) bonds. Ha! I've been warning about these illegitimate Frankenstein spawn of delusional regulators and desperate banks ever since their first inception! When they were first mooted I warned they were dangerous - so good to know the ECB's finally listened.

Spit it out

Mint – Blain’s Morning Porridge

If you don’t like a Chateau Margaux, he told an American audience, spit it out.