December 02 2015

Vendor musings, CCP equivalence concerns, IDB intel and more…

Public Markets

Citadel Steps Up Criticism Of IEX’s Plan To Start New Exchange

Annie Massa – Bloomberg

Citadel is stepping up its criticism of IEX, arguing that the company’s plans to start an exchange that tries to level the playing field between firms with the fastest technology and other traders will actually hurt stock markets. In its second letter to U.S. regulators on IEX’s proposal, Citadel said the exchange application lacks sufficient information and could “harm market quality.” Citadel took particular exception with the disclosure around IEX’s trademark “speed bump,” a coil of wire purported to prevent faster traders from taking advantage of slower ones by delaying all incoming and outgoing orders by a fraction of a second.

More about IEX here.

PLY: Hmmm, in the race to pixel, not enough time to comment but I always have a certain intuitive feeling Citadel has a particularly, Citadel-centric view of the world as it ought to work to their advantage…

Are Vendor Buys Putting Traditional Exchange Business On ICE? (subscription)

Max Bowie – Waters Technology

With the recent acquisitions of Interactive Data and Trayport, does ICE see its future as a vendor, or does it see controlling the entire trade flow as the future? QV Premium: Exchange Deals Brief.

ICE Kicks Off Asian Commodity Futures Hub (subscription)

Philip Stafford – Financial Times

ICE’s Asian hub has traded more than 50,000 contracts in the first two weeks of operation as it taps fast-emerging commodities markets, with business concentrated on mini-Brent futures contracts.

PLY: The mini-Brent future demonstrates all the EU has to think about before they take the suicidal lunge to an FTT. Singapore is open as Europe threatens to shut down free markets.

‘There’s Room For Two’: Reactions To Tullett/Icap Deal (subscription)

Peter Madigan & Duncan Wood – Risk

For 30 years, Tullett Prebon and Icap have been fierce rivals. Now, their match-up is set to create two radically different companies, with different ideas about how to succeed in post-crisis financial markets. QV Premium: Exchange Deals Brief.

US Regulators Propose Powers To Scrutinise Algo Traders’ Source Code (subscription)

Gregory Meyer & Philip Stafford – Financial Times

Under a rule “Reg AT” proposed last week, source code repositories would be open to inspection by CFTC and the US Department of Justice without a subpoena.

TMX Aims To Boost Venture-Exchange Activity (subscription)

Carolyn King & Ben Dummett – Wall Street Journal

TMX said efforts to revitalize interest in the venture exchange will focus on increasing listings, diversifying its issuer base, and reducing issuers’ administrative burden.

MiFID II Concerns Driving Buy Side To Review Best Execution Policies Amidst Tsunami Of Recent Regulations, According To TABB Research

MondoVisione

Private Markets

On Listing, NSE Says One Thing But Does Another

Mobis Philipose – Livemint

Sebi, on Monday, announced changes in some guidelines, which had earlier made listing of exchanges a non-starter. But NSE is bringing new issues to the table, which is understandably irking its shareholders.

PLY: Thoughtful pointers from Mobis Philipose as always.

Bats IPO #2: Bigger & Better Second Time Around (subscription)

Tim Cave & James Rundle – Financial News

Bats is reported to be gearing up for its second attempt at an IPO in early 2016.

Hungary, Investors In Sync For Now Over Stock Exchange Revival

Marton Dunai & Gergely Szakacs – Reuters

Investors in Hungary find themselves in harmony with the government, which has set out plans to revitalise its lacklustre stock exchange by encouraging companies to list, raise money and help boost the slowing economy. The National Bank of Hungary, run by Gyorgy Matolcsy, a close ally of Prime Minister Viktor Orban, last week took control of the Budapest SE, another move by Orban to increase state control over the country’s economy and financial markets.

Myanmar Bourse To Debut On Dec 9

Bangkok Post

Initially slated for October, Yangon SE (YEX) will be launched on Dec 9, according to a statement by Myanmar’s SEC. QV Premium: ASEAN Exchanges Project Brief.

India’s NMCE To Raise Fund Through New Share Issuances

Dilip Kumar Jha – Business Standard

National Multi-Commodity Exchange (NMCE) plans to raise funds through fresh share issuances to achieve the minimum networth criteria fixed by SEBI.

NMCE requires Rs 100 crore ($15m) of minimum net worth by May 2017 of which the exchange currently has Rs 71 crore ($10.6m) including Rs 13 crore ($1.95m) contributed to the Settlement Guarantee Fund (SGF). So, the exchange needs to raise Rs 29 crore ($4.4m) in around 18 months from now.

Can India Have An Independent Gold Exchange?

Shrimi Choudhary – dna

Shaktikanta Das, secretary of Department of Economic Affairs, who mooted the idea, has asked bullion dealers and jewellers to give it a thought and send a concrete proposal to the government.

SEC Charges Bitcoin Mining Companies

SEC

SEC alleges that Homero Joshua Garza perpetrated the fraud through his Connecticut-based companies GAW Miners and ZenMiner by purporting to offer shares of a digital Bitcoin mining operation. In reality, GAW Miners and ZenMiner did not own enough computing power for the mining it promised to conduct, so most investors paid for a share of computing power that never existed. Returns paid to some investors came from proceeds generated from sales to other investors.

PLY: Those “Give us your money schemes and we will mine your way to profit” turned out to be Ponzis? Ah how technology changes but human nature stays resolutely in the ‘plus c’est la meme chose” category.

Special Section: FTI, NSEL, India at the Crossroads

PLY: MCX down 1%, FTIL flat.

Products

Eurex & LCH Reject One-Day Margin Regime For Futures (subscription)

Samuel Wilkes – Risk

Europe’s two biggest derivatives-clearing houses have rejected the idea of changing the region’s margin requirements to cover losses from a member’s default over a one-day period rather than two, potentially prolonging a damaging squabble between the EU and the US over whether their regulations are equivalent.

Clearstream, Eurex Repo & Eurex Clearing Offer Joint Agency Securities Lending

Automated Trader

New service aims to boost securities lending fixed-income volumes.

Career Paths

Alliance News reports that WH Ireland’s Non-Executive Chairman Rupert Lowe left the company on Tuesday. Tim Steel, a NED, will take on the role of Non-Executive Chairman and WH Ireland said it intends to hire a new NED in due course.

PLY: Rupert Lowe, a former LIFFE director and indeed famed victor of paintings at an LCH golf day.

Euronext appointed leading industry practitioner Paul Humphrey as Head of Fixed Income, Rates and FX (FICC) Strategy. Paul will start at Euronext on 4 January 2016. He joins from Thomson Reuters, where he is a Business & Strategy consultant advising the executive leadership team of the Financial & Risk unit, and a strategic advisor to various innovative young companies.

PLY: Interesting hire of an experienced name to work for Lee Hodgkinson, as Euronext continue to inspire going forward…

Solarflare, the leader in application-intelligent networking solutions, appointed John Graham as VP of Marketing.

Financial Calendar

This week

04.12 – Record date CBOE $0.23 dividend

04.12 – TMX $0.40 dividend payment

04.12 – BGC Partners $0.14 quarterly dividend payment

New announcement

07.12 – BIST Extraordinary General Assembly Meeting

All forthcoming exchange / investment related events are now listed in our Events page.

Crowdfunding

Malta – First Crowdfunding Platform Launched

Claire Caruana – Times of Malta

Malta’s first crowdfunding platform, ZAAR, was launched Tuesday.

Aspiring entrepreneurs seeking funding for their start-ups can now promote their project idea on the website, www.zaar.com.mt, to receive small donations from a large group of people.

PLY: Good luck to Zaar and its enthusiastic Manager Karl Grech…

New Zealand P2P Lender LendMe Goes Live

JD Alois – Crowdfund Insider