This Week: Bloomberg, Finos, Broadridge, Fidessa & More

Bloomberg and Grayscale launch future of finance index

A new index built with Bloomberg Intelligence analysis aims to track the performance of several financial services companies projected to be leaders of the emerging digital economy.

This week, Bloomberg and Grayscale Investments announced the launch of the Bloomberg Grayscale Future of Finance Index. The index is built using Bloomberg Intelligence’s proprietary theme basket methodology. It includes companies that Bloomberg Intelligence analysts have projected will contribute to the growth of the digital economy and its overall revenue within the next two years.

Finos grows in 2021, adds new board members

Finos (Fintech Open Source Foundation), a financial sector project of the Linux Foundation, has announced its 2021 annual results. Led by the more than 1,200 contributors working on Finos projects and a 34% increase in new corporate members. Finos present their largest yearly growth on record. In total, Finos now has 53 members leveraging its open-source collaboration forum, including the most recent additions of Bank of Montreal (BMO), Fannie Mae and NatWest Markets in addition to 16 more fintech and financial services organizations this past year.

Finos also added five new board members in 2021, which reflects an exceptional concentration of talent and intellectual capital atop the foundation. Goldman Sachs chief architect for technology John Madsen chairs the board and Kim Prado, CIO for US capital markets at BMO, is the co-chair.

Peel Hunt selects Ion Fidessa for equities market-making

Broker and market maker Peel Hunt has selected Ion as a long-term partner to grow its equity market making business further in European markets, using Ion’s Fidessa trading platform.

As a provider of execution services, Peel Hunt began using the Fidessa Trading Platform nearly 20 years ago to access European markets and RSP market making networks.

Clearsteam, EuroCCP launch pan-European post-trade connection

Clearstream and EuroCCP have launched a new pan-European post-trade connection, making exchange-traded equities and ETFs that are cleared via EuroCCP eligible for settlement via Clearstream Banking.

Clearstream’s Investor CSD solution intends to help participants settle their transactions for all T2S markets and the international market within one account, gaining additional liquidity and efficiency for pan-European transactions. 

The UK-based investment platform Freetrade is the first customer settling a range of markets via Clearstream in the framework of this proposal including Austria, Belgium, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal and Sweden. Further T2S markets are forecast to follow in the coming months.

Broadridge first to connect to automated DTCC corporate actions

Broadridge Financial Solutions has announced that it is the first fintech provider to connect to the Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation’s (DTCC’s) new automated process for submitting instructions for voluntary corporate actions in ISO 20022 format. The newly enhanced Reorganizations service, offered by DTCC’s subsidiary, strives to automate the manual process of submitting corporate action instruction, thereby reducing risk associated with human error and providing significant cost savings for clients.

The program hopes to provide common members of both DTCC and Broadridge’s Global Asset Servicing Solution the ability to manage and execute corporate action instructions around time-sensitive events in a more streamlined and efficient manner, increasing straight-through-processing rates and minimizing the risks associated with manual instructions.

BNY Mellon onboards Korea pensions portfolio

BNY Mellon has announced it has successfully completed the onboarding of the fixed income investment portfolios of the National Pension Service of Korea (NPS), the world’s third largest pension fund.

In addition to custody solutions the company provides for NPS’s fixed income investment portfolios, the expanded remit intends to deliver services through BNY Mellon OMNI^SM, a securities services platform.

Solactive launches responsible indexes for Scotia

Solactive has expanded its relationship with Scotia Global Asset Management, launching a series of reference indices for the Scotia Responsible Investing ETFs, which are listed on the Neo Exchange.

The Responsible Index Series screens exclude companies or issuers that do not comply with established norms, are materially involved in controversial business activities, have material exposure to fossil fuels and/or relatively high carbon intensity profile compared to most of their sector peers. Those standards are based on established norms such as the United Nations Global Compact, the exclusion of significant involvement in defined sectors as well as considerations of gender equality and GHG emission reduction.