New Hong Kong Wealth Manager Chooses OneSumX

Wolters Kluwer Financial Services has signed Nippon Wealth (NWB) as a user of its solutions suite, OneSumX. NWB will be using OneSumX for anti-money laundering (AML) and other regulatory reporting as it establishes operations in Hong Kong.

NWB, a wholly owned subsidiary of British Virgin Islands-registered OJBC, was established in August 2013 and recently acquired approval from the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) to establish a restricted license bank, NWB said in a statement.

According to the HKMA, under the territory's three-tier banking system, a restricted license is principally engaged in merchant banking and capital market activities, and may take deposits of any maturity of HK$500,000 and above.

NWB operates with mostly Japanese capital. Ryutaro Uehara, chief technology officer, tells Inside Reference Data the firm is focusing on serving Japanese mass affluent and high-net-worth individuals, which presents a unique data challenge with regard to AML compliance.

"We had to identify appropriate Japanese data sources to plug into the AML system developed by Wolters Kluwer Financial Services, and also come up with a matching logic so that it would work alongside those Japanese data sources."

He says NWB went with OneSumX for a number of reasons.

The solution provider had multiple integration experience with local Hong Kong banks, as well as Japanese banks in Hong Kong; the cost was affordable for a start-up business like NWB; and it came recommended by a Japanese system integrator, says Uehara.

Additionally, Wolters Kluwer Financial Services offers Hong Kong-based support, "not offshore support, which is normally the case for a global package," he says. "Wolters Kluwer Financial Services also had a historical working experience with our core banking system, Temenos T24."

Chris Puype, managing director for Asia Pacific at Wolters Kluwer Financial Services, comments: "Our Asia Pacific business is witnessing impressive growth, thanks to our expertise and breadth of reach in the region. We are, of course, delighted to be working with NWB at this important point in its history."