Artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies are shaking up major facets of securities operations from robo advisors to reconciliation systems guided by A.I. This award will spotlight the industry participant that has done the most to advance operations via A.I./M.L. operations via natural language processing, A.I./M.L. initiatives.
This award will recognize the IT solution, systems, innovation or service that exemplifies the best that a provider has to offer for buy-side firms as they strive for operational excellence. The winning offering can be a standalone product or service or part of a suite.
The voters will be rewarding the solution provider that has achieved a level of excellence via innovation for the clearing and settlement of market transactions. In addition to the established providers, the voters will consider those vendors breaking ground for new financial instruments and the latest regulatory changes.
This award celebrates the provider that has streamlined the complexity and improved the process of client reporting. The winner will demonstrate that it has improved the customization, look, and feel, and delivery of reports for many kinds of clients and portfolios. The award also recognizes progress in automating reports, managing source data, monitoring the status of productions, and clarity in performance reporting. Innovative uses of AI technologies will be taken into consideration.
Cloud computing has become part of the landscape for securities trading operations. More services and systems that were once strictly onsite are moving to the cloud. This award category is open to a variety of operations providers such as those that provide support via infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS); platform-as-as-service (PaaS); software-as-a-service (SaaS); managed services; and cloud-native solutions.
This award recognizes the provider delivering innovative collateral management capabilities for capital markets firms. Eligible solutions may support margin calculation, collateral optimization, inventory management, dispute resolution, regulatory compliance, counterparty connectivity, and should serve the buy side, sell side, or both. Solutions should also ease interactions between front- and back-office teams. Nominees should demonstrate how their offering addresses the growing complexity of collateral markets, including support for tokenized assets, private credit instruments, and digital collateral models. Submissions should highlight how the solution adapts to new clearing mandates, cross-asset, and cross-border regulatory pressures, and the expanding role of real-time collateral visibility across traditional and digital ecosystems. This category celebrates technology partners helping firms improve efficiency, reduce risk, and meet evolving regulatory requirements.
This award is for the solution that delivers a distinguished offering in a specialized area, designed to help meet a critical compliance need. The winning supplier must demonstrate an ability to keep pace with an evolving industry and show a level of achievement in improving their clients’ needs to meet obligations and optimize their operations. Solutions eligible for nomination can be from any niche area of compliance for equities, fixed income, and derivative instruments. In addition, solutions that focus on relevant aspects of regulatory, legal, data, social, and IT compliance are also eligible.
Corporate actions processing continues to advance and this award spotlights the provider that has incorporated industry standards, advanced automation, data management, ESG data, and emerging technologies. The winner in this category will have helped its clients move closer to automation and streamlined processing.
This award shines the spotlight on the provider that has achieved a new level of modernization via a financial technology solution for middle- and back-office post-trade operations. Eligible areas of consideration include intelligent automation, real-time processing, distributed ledger technology, predictive analytics, and other emerging technologies that push the boundaries of what's possible in securities operations. The winner will demonstrate that its pioneering solution represents a genuine leap forward—eliminating manual processes, driving unprecedented efficiency, or solving problems in entirely new ways.
Internal and external financial crimes against financial institutions are on the rise and firms are fighting this battle on many fronts. Providers have been advancing solutions to combat internal and external acts of fraud, insider trading, cyber-attacks, money laundering, terrorist financing, and multiple forms of corruption. This award will shine the light upon software, services, systems, and advances in surveillance that help firms protect themselves from danger and reputational damage.
The middle office plays an important role in optimizing securities operations across the trading enterprise. The winner in this category will be chosen from the ranks of middle-office operations providers that offer IT resource management services, risk management, risk data analytics, client and security master database support, and services for the coding, configuration, and verification of transactions.
The middle and back-offices are no longer autonomous groups existing independently of each other. They are linked by multiple operations serving multiple assets, which would be hurt by a siloed approach. This award will spotlight the Ops offering that helps firm facilitate more efficient integration between middle- and back-office applications, particularly IT innovations that eliminate manual systems, legacy solutions and pave the way for operational efficiency.
This distinction focuses attention on the solution from a startup or an established provider that launched an exceptional offering during the past year. The new product should bring new efficiencies and new benefits to middle- or back-office systems. The new offerings to be considered should help the buy side meet crucial operational efficiency demands. New offerings for consideration can come from established providers or newcomers to the industry.
Operational risk permeates everything that a financial services firm does, including securities trading and all the steps needed to complete a transaction. This award will reward the provider that has shown the most creativity in mitigating operational risk whether it is related to onboarding and KYC challenges, reputational concerns, margining and collateral management woes, data mismanagement, disaster recovery/business continuity, corporate governance, and other issues that may hamper operations.
Outsourcing plays a key role for many facets of securities operations. This category honors the provider that offers valuable, reliable, cost-effective and efficient outsourced services to the buy side. The winner in this category will be honored for offering the highest levels of reliability, security and adaptability, and for demonstrating capabilities for rapid implementations and flexible consumer models.
This award celebrates the provider with a proven record of offering optimal performance measurement capabilities that help firms evaluate and communicate investment results. Eligible solutions have made advances in returns calculation, portfolio and composite performance, attribution analysis for equity and fixed-income portfolios, benchmark comparisons, ex-post risk measurement, or GIPS compliance. The winner will exemplify how a provider helps clients achieve accuracy, efficiency, and clarity in measuring and reporting performance.
This award recognizes the provider delivering innovative reconciliation capabilities for securities operations. Eligible solutions may address cash, position, transaction, or inter-system reconciliation across traditional and digital assets. Solutions leveraging AI, machine learning, or automation to accelerate exception management and reduce manual effort are encouraged to apply. The winner will demonstrate how its solution helps firms achieve accuracy, efficiency, and scalability in their reconciliation processes.
Once firms have optimized their internal compliance ecosystems, they often need the support of regulatory technology providers. The RegTech providers considered for this category have demonstrated that they can help firms efficiently meet the external reporting and other demands of regulators, anti-money laundering requirements, and the latest domestic and international economic sanctions of governmental authorities. Suppliers that help participants with compliance in the listed, over-the-counter (OTC), and non-cleared derivatives markets are also eligible for this honor.
This award will recognize a behind-the-scenes individual who has been highly effective in advancing a major financial technology issue impacting the industry. The person to be honored has devoted much time and effort toward proliferating a new standard, a key technology initiative, a regulatory-related project or a technology breakthrough that benefits the industry. The winner in this category must show that he or she can work across the aisle with business executives and staff.
This award honors an executive-level individual who has advanced the cause of financial technology innovation from the business side of the aisle. The winner of this award can be from a solutions provider, an end-user firm, or related consultancy committed to improving securities operations for financial services firms. The winner must demonstrate that he or she has effectively worked with IT managers and operations staff.
This is one of the most prestigious honors in the FTF Awards program, recognizing a provider that has demonstrated overall excellence across the board. The winner will have distinguished itself through exceptional client service, industry leadership, innovation, and measurable impact on clients' success. This award goes beyond excellence in a single category — it celebrates a provider that has elevated the standard for what it means to serve capital markets firms.
This is one of the most prestigious honors in the FTF Awards program, recognizing a software solution that has made an outstanding impact on securities operations. The winner will have delivered clear business benefits, advanced the state of the industry, and demonstrated innovation that sets it apart from the competition. This award goes beyond excellence in a single function—it celebrates a solution that has transformed how firms operate.
The FTF News editor, a panel of judges, and FTF News readers can nominate a provider, industry group, end-user financial services firm, user group, or individual that has embarked upon a successful financial IT project or industry initiative that has advanced operational efficiency and governance. The editor and the judges will pick the top nominees and then the ultimate winner. The group or person to be honored in this category can be selected from a variety of Ops and governance areas, including whistleblowers, operational data providers, financial services firms that achieved an exemplary implementation of an Ops system, or a new provider that disrupts the industry in a positive way.
The purpose of these awards is to celebrate and recognize the professionals, financial technology vendors, service providers, industry bodies and regulators that have made significant strides and noteworthy achievements in operational excellence during 2017.
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