On the campaign trail for the Democratic presidential nomination, candidate Bernie Sanders has been hammering away at Wall Street and its impact upon the economy, calling for the return of the Glass-Steagall Act, the breakup of large banks, and other reforms that he says go further than the Dodd-Frank Act. However, the proposed changes from… Read More >>
CFTC Targets the Op Risk of High-Speed Trading
The CFTC last week unanimously proposed new rules to cut risks related to high-speed trading via the algorithms used by designated contract markets (DCMs). Some analysts say the rules will give the regulator more tools to deal with this key aspect of derivatives trading. However, others caution that the regulator should not put forth rules… Read More >>
The Anti-Climactic Sale of SunGard
SunGard officials today quietly withdrew their bid to U.S. regulators for an initial public offering (IPO), according a report by the Reuters news agency. The IPO filing took place this past June and raised the hopes of investors and those current and former SunGard employees that would have benefited from a sexy IPO. Of course,… Read More >>
The Ongoing Woes of FCMs
Derivatives expert John P. Needham, president of Needham Consulting, alerted us more than a year ago at Financial Technology Forum’s DerivOps Chicago conference in April 2014 to the fact that 10 futures commission merchants (FCMs) are handling 75 percent of U.S. customer segregated funds…
U.S. Bank Pays $18M Settlement for Alleged Lax FCM Oversight
A federal court has ordered U.S. Bank to pay $18 million to customers of Peregrine Financial Group (PFG), the now-bankrupt futures commission merchant (FCM) accused of defrauding its customers of more than $200 million, allegedly in part because of lax controls at U.S. Bank that allowed the fraud to go unnoticed. The episode highlights the… Read More >>
Bigger Volumes Meet Fewer FCMs
Fewer futures commission merchants are handling greater volumes of U.S. customer segregated funds compared to a decade ago, resulting in 75% of these funds being held by 10 major FCMs, reports John P. Needham, president of Needham Consulting, in his presentation for FTF’s DerivOps Chicago conference this week. The segregation of funds stipulates that broker-dealers… Read More >>
