Good Morning and welcome to Issue 1007 of Exchange Invest which might correspond to a funky little Peugeot with sliding doors but it hardly becomes us to get too excited about it.
In other news, I see Malawi’s First Merchant Bank Is taking over Barclays Bank Zimbabwe – how soon before they bid for the whole of Barclays I wonder?
Prosperity UK Video
Prosperity UK Panel – Brexit, Euro Clearing & Financial Market Structure: panel ably chaired by Barney Reynolds headlining parish luminaries Jeff Sprecher and Michael Spencer, with one Patrick L Young lurking in the background – perhaps the ‘hot button’ parish topic in derivatives of the moment…
In Today’s Exchange Invest
ICE buys into the battle of the Bond Indices. No sign of London’s Brexit apocalypse.
And there’s more, happy scrolling:
In BigWorld
Not clear if all the hot air generated by those complaining have either actually read the Paris agreement or are offsetting their emissions either approach might be an idea to salve the frenzied liberal mind.
Overall in Bigworld, there’s lots to see, here’s a little digest of some interesting reading for the weekend:
‘Dysfunctional’ EU has plunged into existential crisis, George Soros warns
PLY: Sound statement later ruined by a suggestion Britain will seek to rejoin the EU before it has completed Brexit – the apposite word I think here is “woof.” So some logic and some nonsense from the New York bubble.
Meanwhile Paul Allen who bailed so early from Microsoft he is only the 35th richest man in the world apparently, has just finished the first aircraft with a larger wingspan than Howard Hughes’ “Spruce Goose” – which is intended to enable rockets to head off to orbit without the extra fuel of launch on earth.
There’s a good reflection on Trump and how he might like to channel a bit of the great President Reagan here while Daniel Hannan MEP writes a brilliant missive on the ugliness of Marx and the madness of those still believing in his horribly flawed theses.
If you are into general elections, it’s quite fun to peruse this missive on the BBC where its reputation as the Bolshevik Broadcasting Corporation always comes to the fore when they organise public panel discussions.
It’s the Maltese General Election at the weekend, which will deliver an interesting aftermath and then next Thursday it’s the British General Election, on which note: Britain’s leading financial newspaper City AM interviews PM Theresa May
Have a great weekend, here are today’s points and pith:
Public Markets
Intercontinental Exchange Announces Agreement to Acquire Global Research Index Platform from Bank of America Merrill Lynch
The ICE
PLY: ICE snaps up over 5,000 fixed income, currency and commodity (FICC) indices, just days after LSE bought the index business of Citi for $685 million. Good deal to roll in to IDC.
Land Grab In Hot Bond-Index Business Lures ICE, LSE
Bloomberg
QCA Marks 25 Years Championing UK Growth Companies On The Stock Market
QCA
PLY: Plaudits to QCA which has seen the UK listing environment change enormously over 25 years with not just the LSE platforms including AIM but also the growing number of competitive enterprises challenging the incumbents such as NEX Exchange…
London’s Brexit Apocalypse Is Nowhere in Sight
Bloomberg
A year after the Leave vote, Britain’s capital is scheming to dominate global finance, Europe be damned.
PLY: ….but then again if you have been reading Exchange Invest for a year or two, you will have already known, long in advance even of the historic vote of June 23rd itself, that Brexit meant anything but the economic apocalypse prophesied by the singular dismal crystal ball readers of a vast swathe of legacy media and the blob.
Taming The SGX : A Profile Of Boon Chye Loh, Singapore Exchange’s CEO
www.waterstechnology.com
JPMorgan Raises Indirect Stake In Moscow Bourse To 5 Percent
Reuters
S&P Global Ratings Withdrew Foreign Currency LT Credit Rating For LCH Clearnet Group
Cbonds
PLY: Somebody unsubscribed?
Financial Minds: Ashish Kumar Chauhan, MD And CEO Of The Bombay Stock Exchange
University of Nottingham
PLY: Genuinely sorry I didn’t know about this earlier as I would have been tempted to attend myself, next Monday in Nottingham, England…
London Stock Exchange Group Plc – Total Voting Rights
London Stock Exchange Group Plc Transaction In Own Shares
MondoVisione
Notice of NZX Annual Meeting 2017
MondoVisione
Private Markets
New Strategy To Boost Vienna Stock Exchange As European Hub
Management to boost VSE’s international standing by expanding product offering and intensifying global marketing.
IEX Chief Vows To Stick To Guns On Changing Markets
Financial Times
PLY: The Brussels Bugle gets its pitch wrong in attacking IEX for taking circa 2.5% market share with its niche model approach when surely realism at the plight of the vast bulk of stagnant platforms would suggest this is quite an impressive milestone. However it does note “The exchange says it is profitable, and the $75m it raised from investors in 2014 is still in the bank plus some — though as a private company the group doesn’t disclose its financial performance. Crucially, IEX’s backers still support the mission.”
Stakeholders Seek Sale Of Nigeria SE Shares By Way Of Public Offer
Nigeria Today
Cowan To End Mid-Point Matching In Millennium Dark Pool
Reuters
PLY: Convergex acquisition barely complete and with CEO Eric Noll on the way out, Cowan has already announced it will close the Millennium dark pool by the middle of this month.
Competition Council President: Romanian Gas Trade Can Happen On One Bourse
ICIS
PLY: Looks like the usual squalid Romanian tale of the blob preferring one party to another and potentially manipulating the law to achieve a single marketplace, despite the success of BRM.
Special Section: FTI, NSEL, India at the Crossroads
No news today.
Technology
E-Voting Technology Developed By National Settlement Depository Successfully Used At Sberbank’s AGM
MondoVisione
PLY: The Russian NSD moves forth along the ledger…at which point I may demur on further spot ledger mentions of this kind as we have covered the leaders.
This Blockchain Bubble Might Be A Good Thing
Bloomberg
Products
MTS Launches Global Collateral Management Segment For D2C Repo Trading
MondoVisione
PLY: Cool.
Brazil’s B3, S&P Dow Jones Indices Launch Commodities Futures Index
Reuters
Career Paths
PLY: Interesting developments at HKEX. Former COO and Group Risk Officer (GRO), Trevor Spanner, has been appointed Group CIO and will head the new IT and Platform Development Division. (Particularly interesting as it also infers we may see more new tech systems contracts in the near future). A new GRO is being sought until which time Spanner retains that responsibility. Former co-head of HKEx IT, Richard Leung, has been appointed Deputy CIO. Both these points are newly created.
Roger Lee and Calvin Tai have been appointed Joint COOs at HKEX in addition to ongoing roles as Head of Markets and Head of Clearing respectively. Congratulations to one and all!
Meanwhile in Germany, Dekabank CEO Michael Rüdiger has taken over as Chairman Of The Exchange Council Of The Frankfurt Stock Exchange, taking over From Lars Hille.
Takis Christias has been appointed as Head of Trading Strategies EMEA for Liquidnet Europe from Citi. Parishioners will recall that the brilliant Vacslav “Slava” Glukhov departed Liquidnet Europe a few months back.
Global Investor Group reports that IHS Markit has employed former NLX salesman Alex Reynolds, following former NLX staffer David Helps whose move was mentioned in EI Issue 1000.
DTCC has appointed Matthew Stauffer to lead a new Institutional Trade Processing Business Line.
Crowdfunding
Peer-To-Peer Lending Giant Zopa Confirms £32M Fundraise
AltFi
Zopa, the UK’s original peer-to-peer lending platform, has clinched £32m in its first investment round since early 2014, when it raised £15m from …
P2P Lender Wellesley Retrenches After Departure Of CFO Alasdair Lenman
Crowdfund Insider
PLY: This situation continues to look perplexing.
Other Stories
ESMA Fines Moody’s For Credit Ratings Breaches
Reuters
The European Union’s markets regulator has fined Moody’s 1.24 million euros for failing to give investors sufficient information about how ratings on major institutions such as the EU were compiled.
PLY: #Censorship lives?
CFTC’s Market Risk Advisory Committee to Meet on June 20, 2017
MondoVisione
ESMA Issues Standards On Regulatory Cooperation Regarding Market Abuse
MondoVisione
ESMA Consults On Measures For CCPs To Manage Conflicts Of Interest
MondoVisione
PLY: Doesn’t seem to discuss how governments of the EU are managing their conflict of interest between their political mindset and the practicalities of Euro clearing protectionism as appears to be proposed…
Enjoy your weekend!
Patrick
Patrick L Young
Executive Director DV Advisors