MiFID non-compliance could yield fines of up to €50 million, says JWG-IT think-tank

A recent report entitled ‘Who’s ready for MiFID?’, written by JWG-IT, a think-tank for EU-driven IT change in financial services and published by Thomson IFR, predicts that regulatory fines acro
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A recent report entitled ‘Who’s ready for MiFID?’, written by JWG-IT, a think-tank for EU-driven IT change in financial services and published by Thomson IFR, predicts that regulatory fines across the market will total €50 million for MiFID non-compliance by the end of 2008. The report states that 68% of firms surveyed predict the first external challenges to their best execution performance will come in the first quarter of 2008.

JWG-IT argues that MiFID could be implemented ‘quicker, cheaper and better’ through collaboration across the technology value chain, and as such JWG-IT’s special interest group TechSIG, assembled from market technology suppliers, is pursuing a collaborative approach with regards to developing technology architectures which meet regulatory and market needs.

“The smart investment firms have realised MiFID presents massive infrastructure challenges. The new data and security challenges are complex, real and go far beyond the high profile topics. We are addressing immediate and long term needs,” comments Parm Sangha of Cisco and vice chair of TechSIG.

The group has now achieved a critical mass, having doubled its membership to 22 in the last 2 months.

“TechSIG is working because the members know that it will provide customers with more efficient and effective technology choices. Our first seminar was a small but important step in a long journey, as it confirmed that we are focusing on the right topics with the right model”, comments Nigel Woodward of Intel and chair of TechSIG. “Our next step is to detail the architectures and start testing the logical prototypes.”

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