This Week: TP Icap/Liquidnet, Refinitiv, YCharts, SmartStream, Broadridge & More

TP Icap Plans to Acquire Liquidnet

TP Icap announced that it has agreed to buy Liquidnet for a total consideration of between $575 million and $700 million. Nicolas Breteau, CEO of TP Icap, on the reason for acquiring the US equities trading venue said: “Acquiring Liquidnet is a unique opportunity to transform TP ICAP’s growth prospects by materially accelerating the execution of our electronification, aggregation and diversification strategy. … We intend to build on Liquidnet’s capabilities and connectivity, and expand its offering, particularly in respect of D2C electronic trading in credit and rates. Further, we expect to leverage the data assets and analytics expertise of both organizations to drive non-transaction-related earnings.”

LSEG Agrees to Borsa Italiana Deal with Euronext

The London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) announced it has agreed to sell its entire shareholding in LSEG Italia, S.p.A, the parent company of Borsa Italiana, to Euronext for €4.325 billion (~5.1 million). The sale’s purpose is to help the LSEG’s bid for Refinitiv.

“The Transaction is conditional upon, amongst other things, the divestment of Borsa Italiana or any material part thereof (including MTS S.p.A.) being a condition of any European Commission clearance decision for the Refinitiv transaction,” the announcement says.

Refinitiv Acquires Red Flag Group

Refinitiv has acquired the Red Flag Group, a provider of workflow, data, due diligence, and ratings solutions in the field of ESG. Red Flag is used by compliance professionals looking to evaluate money laundering, bribery and corruption, and reputational and ESG risk. As a result of the acquisition, Refinitiv will look to develop new workflow platforms, due diligence reports, and blend Red Flag’s strengths with Refinitiv’s World-Check risk intelligence database.

YCharts Completes Growth Recapitalization with LLR Partners

LLR Partners’ growth recapitalization with YCharts has completed. “LLR Partners brings to YCharts deep experience within wealth management technology, a collaborative approach, and a strategic vision that aligns with our long-term objectives,” said Sean Brown, president & CEO of YCharts. The investment will help the vendor to add new tools and personnel. 

Morgan Stanley to Acquire Eaton Vance

Morgan Stanley announced it is buying Eaton Vance, which has over $500 billion in assets under management, for an equity value of approximately $7 billion. Upon completion, the deal will boost Morgan Stanley Investment Management’s AUM to approximately $1.2 trillion and raise combined revenues to more than $5 billion. It will also allow Morgan Stanley to vastly build on its wealth and investment management capabilities, as the firm lessens its trading operations.

SmartStream Unveils New AI Tool ‘Affinity’

In collaboration with several tier-1 banks, SmartStream Technologies has launched Affinity, an AI “observational learning” solution that aims to improve match rates in the reconciliations process, which could provide firms with costs savings up to $2 million per year. Affinity gains an understanding of how records correlate to improve and assist in the recon workflow process by observing and learning from a user’s actions. Affinity, which was born out of SmartStream’s Innovation Lab, is available on SmartStream Air, the vendor’s cloud-native AI solution, and will be embedded into its flagship reconciliations solutions.

Speaking of SmartStream Air, the vendor also announced the roll-out of Version 2 of the reconciliations platform. In addition to the inclusion of Affinity and its observational learning capabilities, new features include additional security protocols, such as the PCI-DSS label, which is the most recognized data security standard, according to the vendor. SmartStream’s solutions are also certified with SOC 1, SOC 2, SOC 3, attestation, and ISO 27001 and ISO 27002 standard.

Broadridge Taps 7 Chord for Bond Pricing

Broadridge Financial Solutions has selected 7 Chord to provide intraday corporate bond prices on Broadridge’s new digital corporate bond trading platform, LTX. 7 Chord’s predicative pricing engine BondDroid will be integrated with LTX’s pre-trade analytics tools to provide buy-side firms and dealers with an independent assessment of current market value to inform investment decisions.

TORA Expands OEMS Offering to Include Fixed Income

Trading platform provider TORA is expanding its order and execution management system (OEMS) to support fixed income. New additions to the platform will allow traders to access bond liquidity, as well as execute and manage bond orders. The platform covers government, sovereign wealth funds, supranationals, agency, investment grade corporate bonds, high yield, emerging markets, covered bonds, and municipal bonds. It also provides pre-trade compliance controls, pre- and post-trade allocation, real-time position-keeping, and P&L monitoring.