Saxo Bank, Ovum, Axiom and more…

Saxo Bank has introduced futures spread trading to its technology platforms for institutional and retail clients.

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Saxo adds futures spread trading to platforms

Saxo Bank has introduced futures spread trading to its technology platforms for institutional and retail clients.

Clients can trade futures spreads on a number of different assets across all of Saxo Bank’s platforms. The product offers trading of intra-market futures spreads and names calendar futures spreads on contracts including gold, oil, interest rates, bonds and major stock indices.

Futures spread trading enables traders use a single order ticket to roll over futures contracts before expiry to the next maturity date with no legging or spread risk.

Patrice Henault, futures and listed option product manager for Saxo Banks, said: “The calendar spread trader positions himself between the speculator and the hedger. Rather than take risk of excessive price fluctuations, he takes on the risk in the difference between two different trading months. Calendar spreads are less volatile than other forms of trading including share trading, option trading and straight futures trading.” 

Banks warned to prepare for “smarter” DDoS attacks

Banks should prepare for more sophisticated cyber security and distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks than they have previously faced, according to research from technology consultancy Ovum.

As well as the more conventional large-scale DDoS attacks that banks have faced in the past, Ovum said smarter and more financially motivated exploits are likely to use DDoS techniques to avoid detection.

Rik Turner, senior analyst, financial services technology at Ovum, said: “We have seen a trend of DDoS attacks being blended into other activities in order to throw banks off the trail of more financially motivated exploits. By employing a DDoS alongside an account hacking attack, the criminals hope to enjoy more time to transfer funds and remove traces of their activities.”

It claimed a multilayered approach to DDoS mitigation will be necessary, tackling more sophisticated attacks with filtering while also being able to absorb the huge volume of messages created by more conventional DDoS. 

ICBC to use Axiom platform for derivatives reporting

Reporting and risk management software provider Axiom Software Laboratories has been selected by the UK arm of Chinese bank ICBC to assist with its European derivatives trade reporting requirements.

Under the European market infrastructure regulation, firms must report all their derivatives transactions to a registered trade repository.

Axiom’s platform will give ICBC data transformation, calculation and reporting process transparency to satisfy the trade reporting regime, which was introduced last week.

“Global banks such as ICBC London must adapt to a wide range of new regulations and data quality processes to tackle the effects of inaccurate reporting and reduce spending on reconciliation process,” said David Attenborough, head of EMEA sales, AxiomSL.

Study finds firms risking growth with legacy systems

A significant number of asset managers are relying on outdated core systems, limiting their product and business development, according to a white paper authored by a professor at the Stern School of Business, New York University.

The white paper, published by technology provider SimCorp and written by Ingo Walter, professor of finance at Stern, said that too many asset managers are continuing to use legacy systems, which can be inflexible and increase risk.

Over a quarter of firms polled globally still use legacy systems despite the risks they pose and their inability to cope with the many regulatory changes the industry is facing.

Klaus Holse, CEO of SimCorp, said: “Firms face significant challenges in today’s environment; fees are being squeezed by investors, reporting demands are increasing, and strategies and asset classes are growing more complex. These factors all reinforce the pains of being on a legacy system.”

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