ICE promotes some key managers, KCG attacks the SIPs, Neptune invites folks to its big tent, Blythe Masters talks DAH, ambulance chasers attracted to P2P lending, ESMA edging towards less protectionism in swaps, as Eris announce futures changes. And there’s more, lots of interesting nuggets today, happy scrolling:
Public Markets
A Big Trader Just Joined SIP Criticism
Annie Massa – Bloomberg
PLY: KCG criticises the SIP which leads me to wonder… Is it so slow that it inhibits the purity of the 350 millionths of a second argument which is being deployed by the HFT fundamentalists against IEX applying for an exchange licence when it strikes me there are other dams with folks’ fingers in the holes? …Which leaves us a tad challenged to measure the whole thing/mess (delete as appropriate) holistically? But, hey what do I know, I’m just some European derivatives guy, clearly not expert in the bonkers binary mad world which is US equity cash markets where overcomplexity is a badge of honour…
ESMA To Cooperate With Mexican & South African Regulators On CCPs
Mondovisione
PLY: Gradually it appears ESMA are getting it together in working towards CCP recognition away from the prevailing sense of protectionism immediately post EMIR…
High-speed Traders Have Taken Over NYSE Floor
Matt Turner – Business Insider
PLY: How long before the equivalent of the National Trust just take the floor and use it as a sideshow from whence one can have bellringing continue as a tv spectacle? Speaking of which I see the folks of FIA are indulging in a spot of campanology to close NYSE…
Nasdaq
Thomson Reuters has published its sixth annual State of Regulatory Reform special report…
Eurex Delays Asia Launch Again To Late 2017 (subscription)
Alice Atwood – FOW magazine
Deutsche Boerse has again pushed back the launch of its new Asian exchange and clearing house, this time to the end of next year,
PLY: Poor planning, poor management, certainly poor strategy. Not a good thing to see under the early stages of the Kengeter management when DB1 needs to demonstrate more vigour and a death to its laurel resting of recent times. Given how this has happened several months into his term, I cannot imagine it will please the CEO given his new centralised hierarchy… Heads to roll soon?
IDX Eyes 200000 More Retail Investors This Year
Jakarta Post
The Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) is looking to increase the number of individual investors in local equities by 200,000 this year.
East Africa: EAC Stock Markets Integration Delay Costing Region
Peterson Tumwebaze – AllAfrica.com
Delays in the implementation of the East Africa Community (EAC) stock markets integration project are costing the region development capital and should be expedited.
SECP Introduces Complaint Drop Box Facilities At Stock Exchanges
Associated Press of Pakistan
The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) is providing complaint drop boxes at Pakistan Stock Exchange Limited (Lahore, Islamabad and Karachi), National Clearing Company Limited, Central Depository Company (CDC) to further facilitate investors to swiftly lodge their complaints.
PLY: Digital, anybody?
INVESTOR ALERT: Investigation Of LendingClub Corporation Announced
Business Wire (press release)
Law Offices of Howard G. Smith announces an investigation on behalf of investors of LendingClub Corporation concerning the Company and its officers possible violations of federal securities laws.
PLY: P2P lending has clearly arrived, the ambulance chasers are after it… Who knows, next even more central bankers might notice it.
Tyler Gellasch – Healthy Markets
PLY: Interesting, worth reading blog posting from a group of buy side folks in the US.
Private Markets
Up To 40 Buy-Siders To Join Project Neptune
Hayley McDowell – The Trade
Project Neptune is predicting a rise in daily inventory by the end of January after it invited 40 new buy-side partners to join its platform, with the project’s senior management earmarking the dollar desk and emerging market operations as priority areas for expansion in the coming months.
PLY: Clearly if the buy side turn up with inventory to the party, this will mark considerable progress but sometimes you invite lots of people to parties and they stay home and watch HBO…
Bloomberg TV
PLY: Alas a glitch is precluding me watching this video but it strikes me as pertinent…
Sebi Reviews Risk Systems In Choppy Markets
Anirudh Laskar & Jayshree P. Upadhyay – Livemint
Sebi is examining whether the rules and trading norms in place are sufficient to mitigate risks from possible market manipulation or disproportionate unwinding of derivatives positions
FXCM Amends Stockholder Rights Plan
Nasdaq
FXCM Inc. announced that its board of directors has voted to extend and amend the terms of the company’s stockholder rights plan. The rights have been amended in order to protect the interests of the company and its stockholders by helping preserve the value of the company’s net operating loss carryforwards and tax credits
S.Korea To Explore Currency Changes To Qualify For MSCI Advanced Market Index
Reuters
South Korean authorities will discuss measures to improve the won currency’s convertibility as part of an effort to get the Korea Exchange included in MSCI’s developed market index, the financial regulator said on Wednesday.
PLY: It does strike me as a tad dumb that South Korea which is way ahead of Europe in terms of technology deployment at street level alone, and is powering most of our cell phones etc is not already in the list of 23 developed markets.
The Next ‘BitLicense’ Will Impact All Of Wall Street
Michael del Castillo – New York Business Journal
The last time New York got involved in regulating bitcoin and its related technology the resulting “BitLicense” affected a few upstart innovators on the cutting edge of financial technology. But this time around, with a brand-new person in the state’s top financial regulation position, additional controls would likely impact all of Wall Street. Or at least, any part of Wall Street using the technology that underlies bitcoin, called the blockchain.
PLY: Given BitLicense one turned out to be a shambles of old fashioned nanny state anti-innovation interventionism, do we feel confident this will get better with more legislation?
Special Section: FTI, NSEL, India at the Crossroads
PLY: MCX and FTIL flat to slightly up today, no news…
Technology
Abu Dhabi SE Virtual Trading Simulation Agreed
Mondovisione
Chi-X Australia Selects Solarflare To Enhance Electronic Trading Capabilities
Mondovisione
Solarflare, the leader in application-intelligent networking solutions, will deploy with Chi-X Australia, to reduce latency and improve the performance of the company’s trading platform.
Products
Hotspot Link To Enable Customer Private Liquidity Pools
Mondovisione
PLY: Interesting idea, essentially allowing customers to develop their own pool using preferred sources.
Eris Launches Major Expansion of Standard Swap Futures
Mondovisione
PLY: Considerable expansion as Eris expands its leading swap futures product.
Dubai Exchange Launches Equity Futures For US, Indian Stocks
Economic Times
DGCX launched a financial futures product enabling investors to trade the prices of five US & 10 Indian stocks: The Global Single Stock Futures.
SGX Launches New Derivatives Contracts
LNG Industry
Singapore Exchange has its new SGX FOB Singapore SLlnG LNG derivatives contracts.
Thailand Futures Exchange Ready For First Agricultural Trading “RSS3 Futures”
Mondovisione
TFEX under the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) group, plans first agricultural derivatives product ‘RSS3 Futures’, ribbed smoked rubber sheet futures, February 15 2016, post the The Agricultural Futures Exchange of Thailand (AFET) merger.
Moscow Exchange To Streamline Equity Market Liquidity Support Program
Mondovisione
Moscow Exchange is making changes to the liquidity support program for its Equity Market from 1 February 2016 to incentivize market makers and attract new participants
Euronext Says To Launch European Sugar Futures At End 2016
Reuters
Euronext will launch European sugar futures at the end of this year in anticipation of the ending of the European Union’s sugar quota system. Euronext will offer Euro-denominated contracts for white sugar that will be physically deliverable.
PLY: Good move.
Indexes
Solactive Launches Low Carbon Index Family
Mondovisione
Solactive AG in collaboration with South Pole Group has launched a low-carbon equity index family.
Career Paths
Effective February 1st, Jeff Sprecher will change/create 3 direct reporting roles, occupied as follows:
Ben Jackson, President & COO of ICE Futures U.S, has been named ICE’s Chief Commercial Officer (a newly created role). This makes Jackson responsible “for leading the integration planning and execution of ICE’s acquisitions and joint ventures.” Jackson joined ICE in 2011 from SunGard where he led the company’s energy and commodities business.
PLY: NB Note some media inferred Ben Jackson is leading ICE’s acquisition strategy – there is a bit of a difference between integration, planning, & execution and actually the deal doing stuff: that is clearly still in Jeff Sprecher’s brief.
Lynn Martin, a 15 year ICE veteran, President & COO of ICE Data Services, has added responsibility for Interactive Data, which ICE acquired in December 2015, to her leadership of ICE’s global data operations.
Trabue Bland, VP Regulation, replacing Ben Jackson, will become President of ICE Futures U.S., having joined from the CFTC in 2007.
Source, an ETF company has appointed Jane Drew to the new role of Head of Corporate Communications. (As, until now, I cannot recall ever hearing of the company, this is clearly a welcome appointment).
Indiegogo CEO & Co Founder Slava Rubin will be replaced by current COO Dave Mandelbrot. Rubin will be taking on the new role of Chief Business Officer at the crowdfunding powerhouse after 8 years as CEO.
According to Graduateland, Cinnober is offering internship opportunities to students in year 4 or 5 at Umeå University, within the area of System Verification of advanced financial marketplace systems. Internship period: 6 months starting March 2016. Working hours: Part-time, for at least two days a week.
Financial Calendar
28.01 – Nasdaq Q4 2015 Results
New! 10.02: BGC Partners ‘Fourth Quarter And Full Year 2015 Financial Results
All forthcoming exchange / investment related events are now listed in our Events page.
Analyst Notes
Charles Schwab Corp (SCHW) Receives “A+” Credit Rating from Morningstar
ICE Price Target Increased to $299.00 by Deutsche Bank – “Buy” Rating
NASDAQ OMX price objective increased from $65.00 to $66.00 by Deutsche Bank – “Buy” Rating
A full table of current analysis can be found on our Analyst Ratings page which is updated daily.
Crowdfunding
Real Estate Crowdfunding Platform EarlyShares Joins CFX Markets
Samantha Hurst – Crowdfund Insider
Secondary market for crowdfunding assets, CFX Markets, announced the addition of real estate crowdfunding platform Earlyshares to its network. The real estate crowdfunding platform will now allow its investors to list shares on the CFX secondary market, subject to SEC resale restrictions
Bloomberg Names Crowdcube One Of UK’s Most Innovative Businesses
Samantha Hurst – Crowdfund Insider
Crowdcube announced it was named of UK’s most innovative businesses by Bloomberg in its inaugural Business Innovators List.
Estonia Based Investly Launches P2P Lending In The UK
JD Alois- Crowdfund Insider
Following a €600,000 investment, Investly has launched a peer to peer lending platform targeting UK SMEs. Investly is an invoice finance platform similar to market leader MarketInvoice.
5 Surprising Truths From A Crowdfunding Advocate
ALBERT SANTOS – Crowdfunders.Asia – CoAssets
Other stories
OCC Talks CCP & Delivering Market Strength & Safety
OCC (Video)
OCC staffer John Fennell explains how OCC provides confidence and strength to financial markets as a CCP.
Public, Private Investors Don’t See Eye-To-Eye On Online Lending
Cromwell Schubarth – Upstart
There appears to be a widening gap between public and private investors’ appetites for online lenders.
How Will Bitcoin Technology Go Mainstream? An Analysis Of 5 Strategies
Laura Shin – Forbes
If 2015 was the year that financial institutions realized the power of the technology behind Bitcoin (called the blockchain) — with Visa, Goldman Sachs, Citi and other Wall Street incumbents joining venture capital firms to pour $488 million into the industry — 2016 may be the year this technology begins to be adopted in a more mainstream way.
The Esoteric Debate That’s Tearing The Bitcoin World Apart, Explained
Timothy B. Lee – Vox
When you make a payment using Bitcoin, the recipient is supposed to get the money in less than an hour. But last summer, a few users started noticing that payments were taking a lot longer — 12 hours in one case, 14 hours in another.
The problem was that the Bitcoin network was getting too crowded to accommodate everyone who wanted to use it. In recent months, most payments are still going through without delays. But as Bitcoin continues to get more popular, congestion and slow payments are going to become a bigger and bigger problem.