I have to admit to being excited overnight as this is a great day… 917 in Exchange Invest issue terms corresponds to one of the most fundamentally awesome concepts in Porsche design and speedy engineering achievement. If you can look at the wondrous 356 or early 911 and not be moved, you have no heart. If you can watch a 917 – even on film (qv Steve McQueen’s Le Mans) then frankly you have no soul.
There are so many highlights in the history of a simply incredible story creating an amazing car. However the 1971 917K which won Le Mans is a remarkable beast even by comparison to the others. It ran with a magnesium chassis which was gas pressurised. After its Le Mans victory this chassis never raced again – perhaps for the best… I’m not a big health and safety junkie but the concept of being strapped into what amounts to a stylish variation on the theme of the Hindenburg with a 5 litre flat 12 strapped to the back strikes me as a touch risky, particularly to plunge down the Mulsanne straight at, say 246 mph, for 24 solid hours.
In Video
FinTech, PLY, “Victory or Death” – the future of finance.
In Today’s Exchange Invest
Today in EI, ramifications from Garry Jones insta-departure from LME, BSE IPO opens for subscription and much much more (a lot of fascinating stories in Private markets in particular).
Happy scrolling:
In BigWorld
Meanwhile in Bigworld, that “yuge’ electoral victory caught out Irish bookmaker Paddy Power who recently merged with Betfair.
Convinced of a Hillary win, they grabbed a few headlines by paying out a million Euros to her backers three weeks before the election itself.
This was rather compounded by a further payout of, oops, 4 million Euros when “the Donald” triumphed.
“The one lesson that we have from this is that we should probably pay a little bit more attention to the money,” a Paddy Power spokesman has been quoted as noting at the time.
IMHO another good example of why sticking to CCP related rules for settlement always makes sense, with no exceptions.
Public Markets
LME CEO Resigns After A Difficult Year
Reuters
Change In Senior Executive
HKEXnews
PLY: The low latency retirement of Garry Jones – ultimately caught between an HKEx which needed a return on its steep top of market investment, as well as a marketplace which might finally be exposed to various of its innate foibles, not to mention what Reuters note as a lack of strategy. The final straw of having somebody apparently defrauding the company may have resulted in an unseemly silence at LME and parent HKEx but it was clearly not helpful to the CEO or the COO maintaining their positions.
There is still a need for a broad clearing of the air.
Then again there is an alternative angle here – in slightly longer than Garry’s CEO term, LME has created a world class real time CCP clearing house powered by Cinnober and created a huge additional trust factor into the market for wholesale metals.
All is not lost within the frequently quarrelsome world of LME but indeed some new clear thinking is required on the ‘front end’ to match the laser like precision of the clearing house’s largely unsung achievements.
Terry Duff On Trump, China & A $1 Quadrillion Question
Businessinsider India
Bursa Malaysia CEO Looks To Well-Established, Developed Capital Market By 2050
Malay Mail Online
Private Markets
BSE IPO Subscribed 51% On Day 1
Livemint
Sebi Allows Delhi Stock Exchange To Exit Stock Bourse Biz
Economic Times
PLY: In 2012 LSE bought a 5% stake in the exchange now abandoning stock listing and trading…
Sebi Seeks Forensic Audit Of MCX’s Trading Software
Livemint
PLY: “The software is owned and operated by Financial Technologies India Ltd (FTIL)…” and some may view this as a little more regulatory noose tightening around the under duress FTIL and Jignesh Shah its founder.
Demonetisation May Sound Death Knell For Dabba Trading!
Economic Times
PLY: “Dabba Trading” being the Indian term for the western “bucket shop.”
Borsa Istanbul To Ring The Nasdaq Stock Market Opening Bell
NASDAQ
PLY: A case of what one might term “Insider campanology”… the BIST (5% owned by NASDAQ) will ring the Times Square bell.
Want a Piece of Mohamed Sanu? Go Out and Buy Some Shares
New York Times
PLY: Discussing Fantex which uses a concept similar to one I developed last century – good idea, partial backing for sports players which results in returns from income if they succeed. I happen to think Fantex is only the tip of this iceberg.
Gibraltar Ups Due Diligence For Stock Exchange Approval
International Adviser
The Gibraltar Stock Exchange (GSX) is giving companies the option to undergo third party due diligence, as part of its efforts to mitigate the impact of Brexit.
Bitcoin Options Firm LedgerX Crosses Key Launch Hurdle
CoinDesk
“It’s really been our focus to really have a clearing house for bitcoin.”
Why SMEs Are Not Attracted To List On The Nigerian Stock Exchange
Nigeria Today
Special Section: FTI, NSEL, India at the Crossroads
NSEL Crisis: How Come The Defaulters Are Still Enjoying After Looting 13000 Investors?
The Target Book – WordPress.com
PLY: The more I see, the clearer it appears to be that this “The Target” book is more aimed at rehabilitating Jignesh Shah than anything else in the NSEL affair – albeit I still haven’t had a chance to read it.
Technology
Nasdaq Successfully Completes Blockchain Test In Estonia
Reuters
PLY: Estonian proxy voting working well via the NASDAQ Blockchain experiment.
Emergency Information
Eurex Exchange
Please be aware that the Eurex T7 system is currently experiencing technical issues. We are investigating and will keep you informed.
PLY: Notice marked yesterday as T7 had a slightly off moment (or slightly off lifetime if you just time in low latency terms). No further clarity that we could find.
Products
CME Group Suspends Trading In European Cocoa Contracts
Reuters UK
PLY: Alas a lack of interest….
China’s Crude Oil Futures Dilemma – Control Or Success?
Reuters UK
SGX Catalist: What’s Next After A Fruitful Decade?
The Straits Times
PLY: Update on the SGX SME market.
Fantasy Justice
The Economist (blog)
FantasyJustice is a crowd-sourced prediction market of sorts, offering a menu of potential Trump justices, on which visitors to its website can vote.
PLY: Another raft of prediction markets, fascinating stuff.
Career Paths
MCX has appointed Sanjay Wadhwa as CFO
Perfect Channel Strengthens Commitment To Advancing Its Product Development With New Chief Technology Officer Appointment
Perfect Channel
PLY: All the best to Jim Leeds, most recently as IT Director at Openlink Financial in the UK, joining the crack team at Perfect Channel.
CurrencyCloud has appointed the former head of architecture and integration at core banking vendor Misys, Ed Addario, as its new CTO.
Bank Executives: Leaving Behind a Life in Comfort
finews.com
PLY: Story mentions former FESE Chairman and CEO of SIX Swiss Exchange, Christian Katz, amongst those senior Swiss executives working with smaller, more entrepreneurial firms.
Crowdfunding
A Peer-To-Peer Puzzle
FT Alphaville (registration)
Saving Stream is a “peer-to-peer” lending startup that provides “short-term bridging loans, secured against UK property”…
Other Stories
ESMA Chair Speaks On Reforms In OTC Derivatives Markets And Benchmarks At Prime Conference
ESMA
Speech By Patrick Armstrong, Senior Risk Analysis Officer, Innovation And Products Team, ESMA: FinTech, Oslo Børs ASA Conference, 18 January 2017
MondoVisione
Thanks as always for reading Exchange Invest and have a great day.
Best wishes,
Patrick
Patrick L Young
Executive Director DV Advisors