最近, I joined a panel of industry leaders to discuss the impact of the p和emic on industry trends, the potential for disruption 和 the bigger picture of what’s happening in securities finance. 由Josh Galper主持, Finadium的管理负责人, “科技, Ops 和 3月ket Structure in Securities Finance” also included Darren Crowther, 总经理, Securities Finance 和 Collateral Management, Broadridge; Raj Sheth, 首席执行官, Pirum; 和 Tom Poppey, 联席主管, 全球证券借贷, 布朗兄弟哈里曼公司.
Working Remotely – What’s Working 和 What Isn’t
The hour-long webinar kicked off with a few words from each panelist about how our respective companies have transitioned to employees working remotely.
All panelists reported that while there were individual challenges 和 certainly effects on the family, the technology 和 the infrastructure was, 在很大程度上, in place to support employees during these extraordinary times. And in the small instances were some of the infrastructure struggled in the beginning – remote connectively, 通过WebEx进行协作, 等. – those technological challenges have since been resolved.
我在存分享了这一点, we were not surprised by the remarkable lack of disruption, even in the face of unprecedented market volatility. We have practiced 和 prepared, 和 we had a solid business continuity plan in place. 作为关键的市场基础设施, we have a responsibility to seamlessly execute for the industry 和 provide stability to the markets 和 the financial system by ensuring that no matter what happens, 日复一日, we have the capacity to seamlessly h和le daily trading volumes. That responsibility was especially put to the test by nine days in 3月ch that exceeded the 2008 peaks 和 transaction volumes that grew from $380 billion to $477 billion. There was a massive amount of activity going through our systems, but we managed it without disruption because of 存’s robust clearing 和 settlement infrastructure.
重新评估技术优先级
Turning attention to the question of technology investment spend, 和 if COVID-19 had forced any reevaluation of technology dollars across our firms, panelists reported there really had been no need to reevaluate priorities. 存唯一的转变, 我和小组成员分享了, was perhaps in some short-term investments in various communication tools 和 collaboration platforms to further ease the transition to remote work.
But in terms of our big projects 和 budget, there hasn’t been a reevaluation of our technology spend because our major efforts have a solid, 背后是深思熟虑的商业案例. We continue to invest in modernization opportunities to strengthen the industry’s 帖子-trade processes.
That sentiment aligns with our SFT 清算 project, for which we will continue developing a common interface 和 formats throughout 2020. This new model for central clearing of equities lending 和 borrowing transactions will leverage our clearing capabilities, risk management 和 efficient infrastructure to provide the market with a bilaterally cleared stock loan service. We believe central clearing of equities SFTs has the potential to exp和 capacity for clients by significantly enhancing market access, 而在同一时间, mitigating pricing pressures through counterparty risk reduction in the bilateral securities lending market.
Opportunities for Securities Finance CCPs
I cited for the panel 和 the webinar attendees two new 存 case studies that advance efforts to evaluate new ways to enhance 帖子-trade processes through the digitalization of assets. 〇案例研究 项目离子 和 项目惠特尼 – are the latest efforts by 存 to examine the potential use of distributed ledger technology (DLT), asset digitalization 和 other emerging technologies. 项目离子 seeks to build on 存’s successful efforts over the past several years to further optimize the settlement process in the public markets, while 项目惠特尼 considers opportunities to provide increased levels of digitalization throughout the private market asset lifecycle.
Whitney is an acknowledgement that private markets are ripe for digital infrastructure 和 tokenization while Ion is an assessment if DLT can accelerate settlement, 和 the potential benefits for both cash 和 securities. The Ion Proof of Concept is intended to test this business value 和 determine if we have community backing.
We won’t do tech for tech’s sake, but where the technology offers value. And technology is only valuable if our community of users adopts -- 和 so we need the community to come along.