This Week: BlackRock/Tradeweb, FactSet, DTCC, RBC and more

BlackRock partners with Tradeweb to improve OEMS

Tradeweb announced that it will integrate its credit trading solutions with BlackRock’s Aladdin order and execution management system (OEMS). In particular, the two companies will focus on corporate, municipal, and emerging market bonds.

The first phase of the product roadmap will give common clients access to Tradeweb’s AiPrice that provides real-time prices for nearly 25,000 corporate bonds on the Aladdin platform.

“By tapping Tradeweb’s institutional, wholesale and retail liquidity, plus connecting related markets such as Treasuries and ETFs, Aladdin users will reap the benefits of this breadth of liquidity, more choice and an arsenal of innovative trading protocols and products,” said Chris Bruner, chief product officer at Tradeweb, in a release.

FactSet, BMLL collaborate on historical tick data and analytics

Level 3 data and analytics provider BMLL Technologies has partnered with FactSet to offer the company’s granular order book history and analytics in the cloud.

The initial release of the FactSet–BMLL offering includes “market by price” Level 2 tick history. The cloud-based tick data and analytics can be used in quant research, back-testing, best execution, transaction cost analysis (TCA), compliance, surveillance, and risk.

FactSet recently made its global archive of Level 1 tick history accessible via Snowflake. The tick data can be combined with FactSet’s other content offerings available in Snowflake, including corporate actions, symbol history, sentiment data, fundamental data, and event transcript data.

Through the joint solution with BMLL, clients can now access Level 2 data via the same symbology and APIs as the Level 1 tick history on a common delivery platform.

In connection with this collaboration, FactSet co-led BMLL’s latest $26 million Series B investment round.

BondIT raises $14 million for digitization of fixed-income investing

BondIT has raised $14 million in a new investment round led by BNY Mellon alongside existing investors. BNY Mellon’s managing director, John Goodheart, will join BondIT’s board of directors as part of the deal.

BondIT’s platform uses AI to automate fixed-income portfolio construction, management, and research. Through it, fixed-income traders can create credit and yield-optimized portfolios.

Acadia rolls out new platform for reporting and analytics

Acadia, which provides derivatives risk management services, announced the launch of its Data Exploration (DX) platform. The new data analytics platform will offer collateral, margin, and risk mitigation data to the sell side, buy side, and fund administrators.

DX will give users access to data such as volume breakdowns by date, organizational and agreement details, pledged collateral trends and breakdowns, as well as dispute monitoring. It also has comparative reporting and benchmarking tools to help users understand their position in the market.

Genus Capital Management selects RBC’s Trade Management Service

Vancouver-based investment management firm Genus Capital Management will adopt RBC Investor and Treasury Services’ middle-office post-trade execution service. RBC’s platform provides post-execution trade lifecycle management, broker performance, and settlement risk information. The service provides Genus with increased control and visibility of its funds’ trading activity, providing a scalable, resilient, global operating model.

Barbados Central Securities Depository becomes 100^th Anna member

Barbados Central Securities Depository has joined the Association of National Numbering Agencies (Anna) as the 100^th full member. This was confirmed at Anna’s extraordinary general meeting in Guatemala. Banque Centrale du Congo and India’s International Financial Services Centres (IFSC) also recently joined the group.

Anna is responsible for assigning International Organization for Standardization (ISO) codes to financial instruments, including Isins, FISNs, and CFIs.

TNS connects to Tel Aviv Stock Exchange as market data vendor

Transaction Network Services (TNS) has begun providing clients with order routing and market data connectivity to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange matching engine, including data on the exchange’s equities. TNS’ low-latency network already incorporates exchange data from Europe, the US, and Asia-Pacific.

Ice Benchmark Administration inaugurates Carbon Reference Entity Data Service

Intercontinental Exchange (Ice) has launched a service to facilitate the management of carbon credits through the trade lifecycle. The Ice Carbon Reference Entity Data Service (Ice Cred) standardizes and aggregates carbon credit reference data and assigns a unique identifier to credits for each project and vintage.

Verified carbon credits are issued for registered projects, and are typically recorded and held in registries that identify the number of credits that have been issued, retired, cancelled or converted. Ice Cred collects this data from global registries and gives each credit a reference code. This is designed to help reduce operational risk and cost, as well as to help analyze, trade, and value carbon credits.

Afme–Protiviti report: Regulatory complexity hinders adoption of cloud services

A report published by the Association for Financial Markets in Europe (Afme) and consulting firm Protiviti has warned that overly complex and unharmonized regulation is holding back cloud adoption in Europe’s financial services sector.

The report, entitled “State of Cloud Adoption in Europe—Preparing the path for cloud as a critical third-party solution,” identifies three other obstacles to cloud adoption in addition to regulation: concentration in the cloud marketplace, data localization, and the management of disruptions in the cloud.

DTCC report: Geopolitical risk and inflation top risks to the financial industry in 2023

The Depository Trust and Clearing Corp.’s (DTCC’s) annual Systemic Risk Barometer Survey has identified geopolitical risks and inflation as the most significant threats to the financial services ecosystem in 2023.

Of the survey’s respondents, 68% cited geopolitical risks and trade tensions as a top threat, up from 49% last year. Meanwhile, 61% said inflation was a top threat, up from just 34% the previous year—the most significant annual jump across all categories. Respondents cited unknowns around how long inflationary pressures may last, as well as the impact of monetary policy and supply chains as key reasons behind their concerns.

Nearly three years since the start of the pandemic, most respondents no longer see Covid-19 as a top threat to the industry, as case numbers continue to decline globally.

“The dramatic increase in concerns around geopolitical risks and trade tensions, inflation and US economic slowdown reinforce how quickly the threat landscape evolves and the importance of regularly monitoring the external environment to gain intelligence into potential shocks to market stability,” said Michael Leibrock, chief systemic risk officer at DTCC, in a press release.