When you look at the way the internet has impacted the way we consume music and news, or the way we shop, it may seem that financial services is perhaps one of the industries on which the web has had the most limited impact.
Apart from online trading, there have been relatively few revolutionary inventions in [...]
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Alison Ebbage’s piece on IT budgets in the March issue of Banking Technology, looks at the potential impact of the credit crunch on IT spend, offset by a desire to use technology to drive efficiency.
There are indeed several issues that could drive firms to keep investing despite the gloomy times ahead. For instance, recent circumstances [...]
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JWG-IT, the neutral think-tank for EU-driven change in financial services, and Cre8 Results, specialist financial services marketing communications agency, today announced their plans for The Forum, a pan-European series of industry conferences, starting in London on 15 April 2008.
The industry forums, encompassing events in Paris, Madrid, Frankfurt and Milan, are designed to clarify the agenda [...]
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The Letters page in the Financial Times has become quite interesting in recent weeks On 20 March, the president of the CFA Institute, Jeff Diermeier, defended fair value reporting, i.e. mark to market.
“Recent market problems stemming from a lack of transparency in subprime lending and securitisations based on such loans have added a new urgency [...]
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Despite the gloom and doom, the beat goes on this side of the pond. Plans are in the works to start an electronic futures exchange, known as Four Seasons, to rival the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME). Among those said to be backing the platform are Bank of America, Barclays Bank, Citadel Investment, Citigroup, Credit Suisse, [...]
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While the nation was embroiled in the Spitzer scandal, a fire sale was in the works. JPMorgan Chase bought Bear Stearns for bupkas – $2 a share, to be exact – the latter having been hit big time by the sub-prime debacle and credit crunch. The Federal Reserve provided special financing for the deal, and [...]
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It was all over so fast, like a winter storm that either sweeps up from the south to bite you in the bum or blows off the Great Lakes to smack you in the face. This time, a pile of snow dumped on Eliot Spitzer, Governor of New York and the bane of Wall Street. [...]
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Here’s a question our advertising manager was asked by a (US) agency working for a large international software house:
“Do you have any psychographic or behavioral insights into the capital markets target? Any information about what you know this audience likes/does not like will be very helpful. “ It’s tempting to suggest reading Bonfire of the Vanities or [...]
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When no active market exists, how do you value assets? Reuters is promoting a plan to develop industry consensus pricing for derivatives and complex securities – see my article in Securities Industry News 10 March.
Philippe Carrel, EVP and global head of business development at Reuters, calls the service, announced on 28 January, an open pricing-model [...]
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Mad Magazine’s Alfred E. Newman has nothing over the former Fed chairman whose recent op-ed piece in the FT calls for better risk models. “In the current crisis, as in past crises, we can learn much, and policy in the future will be informed by these lessons. But we cannot hope to anticipate the specifics [...]
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