Asset Servicing

Despite much talk about the cost and efficiency benefits of digitalisation and clients moving very quickly to adopt it, some parts of the fund sector still rely on manual processing. Some in the sector are calling for regulators to play an increased role in setting standards.

A panel entitled “Trends in fund distribution as investors have become more digital than ever - Is the fund industry ready?” discussed the current situation as part of ALFI’s recent Digi Pulse Amsterdam virtual event.

Acolin, a Zurich-based provider of regulatory and cross-border fund distribution services across Europe, has acquired Luxembourg-based Global Fund Analytics (GFA), a SaaS-based data collection and analytics platform for asset managers and distributors.

Outsourcing middle office activities such as processing transactions made by asset managers’ front offices is the biggest growth market in the asset servicing business, according to State Street’s Dick Taggart. ‘We want to become the Amazon of asset management outsourcing’, he told Investment Officer.

Fund platform Allfunds has announced its intention to list its shares on the Euronext Amsterdam stock exchange “in the coming weeks”. The announcement comes just days after it became public that Allfunds is planning to launch its first 12 mandate solutions on its fund platform.

Luxembourg’s third-party management companies (ManCos) are increasingly positioning themselves as regulatory problem solvers for all types of asset manager. This appears to be a burgeoning niche for the Luxembourg fund and asset servicing industry.

Despite the looming EU deadline on ESG reporting, around a third of boards of UCITS funds and nearly half for alternative funds report had not reviewed the implications of the sustainable finance disclosure regulation (SFDR).

The London-based foreign exchange specialist Monex has opened an office in Luxembourg to serve its EU-based clients after the Brexit transition period ends on 31 December.

The presence in Luxembourg will enable Monex to continue to provide foreign exchange and international payment services to customers based in Europe without any disruptions, said Monex Europe CEO Nick Edgeley.

The creation of a single European electronic payments market is possible, but may be five to ten years away. This was a broad conclusion of the Focus On Payments discussion organised by Luxembourg for Finance on 10 September. What barriers need to be overcome?

The investment industry’s high expectations of robo advice and the use of blockchain technology have not yet been met. For now, robo advisers have failed to make a decisive breakthrough, according to research by the CFA Institute among more than 250 of its member organisations.

A substantial majority of these appear yet not to use big data analysis, machine learning or artificial intelligence in risk management, compliance or the investment process.

Fund distribution platform Allfunds recently launched a separate B2B platform for mandate solutions in Luxembourg. The new service aims to become the leading B2B sub-advisory platform in Europe and bring fiduciary knowledge to the wholesale sector.