Category: MM-First WordOn 29 May 2008 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com 
If you thought that the credit crunch will translate into a slow summer, think again. We’re heading for France of course, but we’ll be working hard (yeah, right – Ed.). But those of you stuck in the City for the heat of the British summer (yeah, right – Ed.) will have their work cut out for them in July and August.
On 30 Apr 2008 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
It’s been quite a month for European clearing and it seems that something unsettling is afoot in the back office.
Could it be that the existing agencies are finally paying attention to Charlie McCreevy’s increasingly vocal complaints that the Code of Conduct between European clearers that he negotiated is progressing too slowly?
On 31 Mar 2008 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
We’ve observed in this column before that at some point even referring to MiFID will be unnecessary, because now it’s here, the post-MiFID market environment in Europe is just the market environment in Europe. And it’s clear that as far as trading and the front office are concerned, the business implications of MiFID have been pretty firmly grasped.
On 29 Feb 2008 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
“Ridiculous” as the timeframe for MiFID implementation might have been, as one luminary described it this month, for the most part the industry managed it on time. As the Commission draws a line under its “completeness” checks (and kicks off the legal process against the transposition laggards), it is moving into the quality phase of its assessment of MiFID implementation. So the focus is shifting to not just did you implement MiFID, but how well did you do it?
On 31 Jan 2008 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
What does “post-MiFID” actually mean, and is there any point in saying it? Now that MiFID is here, the “post-MiFID trading environment in Europe” is actually just “the trading environment in Europe” – or at least it will be when all the countries affected finally implement the changes in full. But the point is at some juncture even referring to MiFID will become unnecessary, because it will be business as usual – in the same way that if efforts to eliminate inefficiencies in cross-border clearing and settlement in Europe work, the phrase “cross-border” will have no meaning anymore.
On 20 Dec 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
Cliché though it is, November 1 really was just the beginning of MiFID-related work for firms and not, as might have been hoped, the end. The compliance boxes might have been ticked, but the effort required to ensure competitive success under the new regime begins now. And if the results of MiFID Monitor’s review of a number of existing best execution policies is anything to go by, a considerable amount of work needs to be done to cope with fragmented liquidity and get up to speed with the kind of military-precision smart order routing capabilities necessary for execution excellence going forward.
On 30 Nov 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
The implications of MiFID for the back office have to date been somewhat overshadowed by its implications for the money-making front offices of Europe’s financial institutions. This is no surprise of course – the back office geeks are well used to having their views ignored until a backlog in processing puts a brake on trading and change absolutely has to be funded. But since the passing of November 1, those representatives of the less glamorous element of securities market activities seem to be having more success in making their voices heard over the clamour about MTFs, SIs and smart order routing. And the main message is that insufficient attention has so far been paid to the post-trade impact of increased pan-European trading volumes.
On 31 Oct 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
Reading our own coverage in the run-up to M-Day, we couldn’t help but chuckle – if that’s the right term – at the fact that the regulation’s framers had deemed it acceptable to go live with the widest-reaching market restructuring for a generation on a day when many of Europe’s national regimes are taking a public holiday.
On 01 Sep 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
The market is buzzing with rumours about new MTFs on the verge of going public – whether from banks in continental Europe, or for derivatives not equities, or a possible venture by a lone bank (though this latter prospect has confused some commentators, who don’t understand why a bank would put business out to a platform that it could simply internalise). Even fairly conservative estimates suggest there could be 10 or so MTF-type initiatives still under wraps, to be revealed in the near future as MiFID implementation approaches.
On 01 Aug 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
For an initiative that has uttered precisely nothing about its plans for a MiFID trade reporting platform, Yellow Submarine has certainly sparked a lot of speculation in these dog days of summer (which is, of course, why that is so). You’ll remember that the Yellow group is led by a selection of German, Austrian and French banks (MiFID Monitor, March 2007).
On 01 Jul 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
No mention that we could find of the perennially thorny issue of counterparty identification in the newly released yearlong SunGard MiFID survey. Which is a shame, since many of the elements discussed in the survey won’t work properly, as we’ve stated in these pages on many occasions, unless the whole shebang is underpinned by a robust, credible and broadly accepted standard for identifying the entity you’re doing business with.
But don’t fret. Help is at hand.
On 01 Jun 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
At the time of writing, we have 120 or so days to go before the MiFID switch-on date. Where do we stand?
On 01 May 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
An industry friend exclaimed this month, “What on earth did we all do before MiFID?” And for sure, this once little-known regulation seems to be underpinning just about anything that moves at the moment.
On 01 Mar 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
While it’s true that the equities crowd seems to have calmed down a bit over MiFID’s still-unclear best execution articles, it’s this particular section of the regulation that, for us at least, seems to constantly attract the most attention.
On 01 Feb 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
At one of the first specifically MiFID-focused industry seminars we attended – around 18 months ago – in preparation for the launch of this publication, we sat through a 90-minute panel discussion in which representatives of a handful of European stock exchanges exhorted to the incredulous audience that the impending EU regulation would have little or no impact on their – the exchanges’ – operations or business.
On 01 Jan 2007 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
Fresh from Greenwich’s loss of the super-casino deal to Manchester, we here at A-Team headquarters think it’s time to start a betting pool on which member states are going to make the November deadline.
On 01 Dec 2006 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
Friedrich Burian, head of risk management at Northern Trust, was quoted this week as saying: “We consider MiFID to be the most important regulatory change in the last decade in Europe.”
On 01 Nov 2006 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
With a year left on the clock, things are at last beginning to heat up, despite a recent survey finding little movement among buy-side organizations. In fact, November can count itself as the most frenzied (if that’s the right word) MiFID month to date, with MiFID-related initiatives coming from all four corners of the marketplace.
On 01 Oct 2006 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
Sifting through the responses to the EC’s call for evidence on transparency, we were intrigued to find some stimulating ideas from MTS Group, which operates a number of electronic trading platforms primarily for the bond markets in Europe.
On 01 Sep 2006 in MM-First Word, MiFIDMonitor.com
The ostrich stance adopted by the marketplace toward the inexorable onset of MiFID appears suddenly to have been dropped.
