Northern Trust Combines Groups for Digital Effort Northern Trust has combined teams and launched a Digital Assets and Financial Markets group that will be “responsible for supporting the fast-growing digital asset markets and those dedicated to providing market access and insights across the traditional securities services markets,” officials say. The step is a recognition of… Read More >>
Senate Bill Pushes Regulation & Innovation for Digital Assets
A bipartisan bill, co-sponsored by U.S. Senators Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), and Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), offers a comprehensive regulatory framework for digital assets that encourages innovation while also protecting against “bad actors” in volatile and highly risky markets. The proposed law, the Responsible Financial Innovation Act, is also meant to boost “financial innovation, flexibility, transparency and… Read More >>
OSSTRA to Launch a Repo Service & Other News
OSSTRA to Debut a Repo Confirmation Service In an effort to bring more automation to repo operations, post-trade vendor OSTTRA has launched a repo confirmation service that is built upon the MarkitWire electronic trade processing platform, officials say. MarkitWire is from MarkitServ, which is part of the OSSTRA joint venture between CME Group and S&P… Read More >>
A Prime Broker for Digital Assets & Other News
Finansiv Offers Link Between Fiat & Crypto Trading Finansiv, a digital asset prime brokerage that caters to retail and institutional investors in Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other digital assets, reports that it has gone live and is executing over-the-counter (OTF) client trades. Finansiv officials say that in addition to offering “access to fiat spot markets,” they… Read More >>
‘Cowen Digital’ Launches & Other News Briefs
Cowen Division Focuses on Digital Asset Custody Cowen Inc. has officially launched the Cowen Digital division to provide a platform for trade execution and custody solutions that support digital assets traded by institutional clients, officials say. The new division, based in Stamford, Conn., offers custody solutions via Cowen’s partnership with PolySign’s Standard Custody & Trust,… Read More >>
SS&C Bolsters Its Open Protocol Service & Other Briefs
SS&C Adds ESG & Digital Asset Exposure Reporting Support The Open Protocol risk reporting service of SS&C Technologies has been improved to include digital asset and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) exposures, a step that brings the service into compliance with the ESG and digital assets reporting requirements of the Standards Board of Alternative… Read More >>
The Fed Is Starting to Think About CBDCs
The Federal Reserve is mulling what a digital currency backed by a central bank would look like. This should come as no surprise given the onset of blockchains and distributed ledger technology, and then cryptocurrencies and digital assets in many forms. They all have had an underlying driver – a disintermediation push to bring on… Read More >>
tZero’s ATS Fumbled Disclosures: SEC
The SEC and the blockchain-based, broker-dealer tZero ATS have reached a settlement in a case where the regulator alleged that the firm while trading National Market System and digitally enhanced securities failed to make timely disclosures via Form ATS before key order book data was shared with third parties. tZero ATS, which is based in… Read More >>
SWIFT Enlists SETL for Digital Asset Ops Pilot
The SWIFT financial messaging and services cooperative is exploring how it might facilitate interoperability among the distributed ledgers used to underpin the tokenized asset market, and London-based blockchain upstart vendor SETL has joined the effort. “SWIFT plans a series of experiments in Q1 2022 leveraging its trusted role as a central platform to explore the… Read More >>
Should the SEC & CFTC Create a Crypto Bureau?
Two of the major overseers of financial markets — the SEC and the CFTC — appear to be in a bureaucratic tug-of-war when it comes to the regulatory oversight of emerging digital assets, and former CFTC Chairman J. Christopher Giancarlo is proposing that the agencies work together to co-create a crypto bureau. In addition, an… Read More >>
