Waters Wavelength

It’s just Shen and Tony on this week’s podcast. To start, they chat about the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday in the US and Rebecca Natale’s undying love for Taylor Swift. Then, they get into the nitty-gritty of the recent announcement by the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) to scrap the replacement of its clearing and settlements system using distributed ledger technology (DLT), and the lessons capital markets firms can learn from this case. Read: https://www.waterstechnology.com/emerging-technologies/7950308/waterswrap-asxs-chess-dlt-meets-calamitous-fate-what-can-be-learned

Joining Tony on the podcast this week is Spencer Lee, chief markets officer at TS Imagine, a trading, portfolio, and risk analytics solutions provider. They talk about the needs of buy-side fixed income traders, innovation in the space, and how traders deal with the various trading protocols. (2:30) – Spencer Lee joins Tony on the podcast and gives an overview of his 20-odd years at the buy side before he joined TS Imagine. (9:00) – They talk about innovation within the capital markets and how fixed income uses those tools. (13:00) – What are the needs of a buy-side fixed income trader? (17:00) – Trading platforms need to cast a wide net to liquidity providers and distill the information into a single view relevant to the trader. (20:00) – A “fancy sports car” for the buy side. (21:30) – What is the impetus to get everyone working together? (26:30) – How is TS Imagine fulfilling the needs and analytics for fixed income trading? (31:30) – They wrap up by discussing the direct dealer connectivity protoco

This week, Wei-Shen speaks with Josephine about her experience attending the World Financial Information Conference (WFic) in Prague in mid-October. She also recounts some of the engineering streams and panels that discussed challenges with delivering and consuming data on the cloud. Do check out her story covering the cooperation between JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs. (https://www.waterstechnology.com/data-management/7950180/goldman-sachs-jp-morgan-join-forces-to-explore-market-data-in-the-cloud)

This week, with no guest in tow, Tony and Shen go off the rails discussing how firms are migrating more workflows and processes to the cloud. They then touch on interoperability, blockchain, APIs, and open source before circling back to the cloud.

This week, Andy Volz, chief operating officer at Clear Street, joins Tony on the podcast. They discuss the challenges existing technology infrastructures pose to the capital markets, the growing necessity of the cloud, and some trends in the market. 9:00 – Andy joins Tony on the podcast and gives an overview of his career and what Clear Street does. 12:00 – They discuss the bottlenecks in capital markets tech infrastructure. 14:00 – Where does the broker community struggle to provide additional insights? 18:30 – The advantage of being “cloud-born.” 20:30 – The lack of innovation in technology and regulation are systemic threats to liquidity within public equity markets. 22:00 – Andy explains how legacy infrastructure adds cost to end-users. 24:30 – Is there something fundamentally changing the markets? 28:00 – They discuss using blockchain in equity clearing and the risk of vendor lock-in. 33:00 – Andy gives an insight into Clear Street’s next growth stages.

James Crosby, founder and CEO of data management firm Fencore based out of Singapore, joins Wei-Shen on the podcast this week. They talk about the risks of vendor lock-in and how firms—both end-users and service providers—are working towards interoperability. 4:30 – James joins the podcast and gives an overview of what Fencore does. 8:30 – They discuss if there’s a balance between creating product stickiness and true openness. 12:30 – What are the biggest risks of vendor lock-in? 15:00 – How should firms balance consolidation of system providers versus spreading across different providers? 17:30 – James talks about how having a single approach to systems is a utopian ideal. 19:00 – What needs to happen to achieve true interoperability between different systems? 21:30 – James walks through the work required in implementing and configuring a new platform. 23:30 – How does providing flexibility to the end-user work from a contracting perspective? 28:00 – They discuss what the end state of interoperability ma

Bill Dauge, head of alternative data at Nasdaq, joins Tony on the podcast this week. They talk about Nasdaq’s partnership with AWS and what it entails, and the trends that are driving this. 4:30 – Bill joins the podcast and gives an overview of his role at Nasdaq. 7:30 – He goes into Nasdaq’s partnership with AWS and the exchange’s overall cloud strategy. 9:30 – Bill outlines the journey to becoming a fully cloud-native exchange and the current challenges, such as speed and security. 15:00 – They assess the cloud landscape and scalability. 18:30 – There is another layer coming: data as a product. 21:00 – The next shift is data delivery mechanism, better query interfaces, tools, and dashboards. 25:00 – Bill addresses the main challenges in deploying cloud infrastructure at scale.

Joining Wei-Shen on the podcast is Enrico Bruni, managing director and head of Europe and Asia at Tradeweb. They discuss electronification in the repo markets, particularly in the dealer-to-client space, and Tradeweb’s “reverse onion” approach. As Bruni puts it, there’s nothing simple in repo land. 7:00 – Enrico joins the podcast and gives an overview of his time at Tradeweb. 8:30 – Then, they discuss the current state of electronification in repo markets in the dealer-to-client space. 12:00 – He walks through Tradeweb’s “reverse onion” approach to automating some repo workflows. 15:00 – What are the existing barriers to further additional electronification of repos? 17:00 – What role do OMS providers play here? 20:00 – The element of bilateral execution can make workflows more complex. 21:30 – Enrico talks about the ongoing initiatives the industry is working on. 22:30 – Then, he discusses the difference between electronification of repos in the US, Europe, and Asia. 28:00 – Enrico walks through Tradew

This week, Manisha Kimmel, chief policy officer at MayStreet, joins Jo Wright on the podcast. They get into the weeds on the NMS plan, the fee amendment, and the comment letters submitted to the SEC. https://www.sec.gov/comments/s7-24-89/s72489.htm https://twitter.com/MayStreetTech/status/1473405655306354691 2:30 – Manisha joins the podcast. She gives an overview of her career before and at MayStreet. 7:30 – Manisha gives background on the so-called CT plan and the Market Data Infrastructure Rule. 9:00 – Litigation is holding up implementation of the plan. 15:30 – They talk about what exactly the fee amendment proposed. 18:30 – Manisha outlines the controversial debate around charging for market data based on cost versus value. 33:00 – What now? Manisha walks through what could happen next.

WARNING: Explicit content. This episode contains swear words, please listen with caution. You have been warned. Tony and Shen go on a long rant about Covid, kids on scooters, and spatial awareness. Enjoy! Merry Christmas!

This week, Jennifer Peve, managing director, and head of strategy and business development at DTCC, joins Wei-Shen on the podcast. They discuss how tokenization could help solve some of the challenges in US private markets and how the Digital Securities Management (DSM) platform that DTCC aims to launch in 2022 can potentially help. 3:00 – Jennifer joins the podcast and gives an overview of the challenges in the private markets and how a tokenized solution can help. 7:00 – Then, she walks through how DSM looks to achieve. 10:30 – What does “good control location” mean? 16:00 – Jennifer details the genesis of Project Whitney and how it led to DSM. 18:00 – She then points to how the transaction consent engine paired the public blockchain and DSM can restrict unvalidated transactions. 22:00 – DTCC could extend DSM to other use cases in the future. 27:30 – There’s a bit more work to do before DSM launches. 30:00 – Jennifer gives her thoughts on how blockchain projects have developed in the past year.

This week, Bill Murphy, managing partner at Cresting Wave, joins Tony on the podcast to talk about innovation discovery, talent acquisition, and technology battlefronts. 5:00 – Bill joins the podcast. 7:00 – They discuss the challenge of recruiting technical talent. 12:00 – The technology innovation space is crowded. 14:00 – Should tech leaders be more willing to take risks? 17:00 – Bill explains the impediments that CTOs face today. 20:30 – Looking at cyber security, how can firms use new tools to protect their organizations better? 23:00 – There are so many technology battlefronts. How does Cresting Wave help organizations? 25:30 – Bill explains how some firms steal time from tech leaders. 29:00 – Then, he gives some advice to CTOs today. 31:30 – They close with predictions for the NBA finals.

We’re stepping a little outside the box this week! Garry Cooper, CEO and co-founder at Rheaply, joins Tony on the podcast to discuss the circular economy. Rheaply is a software-as-a-service company that helps enterprises re-source assets and services. 5:30 – Garry joins the podcast and defines the circular economy. 7: 30 – Then, he details problems with the circular economy and how his company, Rheaply, fits in. 9: 30 – Garry explains the concept of sharing the sugar and how Rheaply technology helps global banks. 13:00 – How important is data to reuse efforts? 17:00 – Is there a way to automate some of the manual processes of gleaning that data? 20:00 - Garry explains how he got into sustainability. 24:00 – Can the circular economy help with inflationary and supply chain issues? 25:30 – How do we convince local governments to take more steps contributing to the reuse initiative? 31:00 – What’s the most random thing Rheaply has ever taken inventory of?

This week, we have a return guest on the podcast. Likhit Wagle, general manager of global banking and financial markets at IBM, joins Tony to discuss mainframe modernization and its importance, particularly since it will be a while before banks put a substantial portion of their mission-critical workloads onto the public cloud. 5:00 –Wagle joins the podcast and details why it’s necessary to consider mainframe modernization efforts. 8:30 – He says banks need to prioritize which applications should be modernized and rationalized. 10:00 – It will take some time before banks put a substantial chunk of particularly mission-critical workloads onto the public cloud. 11:00 – Firms want to be cloud native. Why is it important to modernize mainframes if the end goal is to move away from them? 15:00 – Wagle says the winning strategy is a hybrid strategy—public, private, on-prem. 16:30 – Then, he walks through IBM’s latest z15 mainframe, and the new version, which will come out in early 2022. 18:00 – Where do mainf

This week, Geoff Horrell, head of innovation at the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG), joins the podcast to talk about the exchange’s innovation strategy after the Refinitiv acquisition, deep learning, and the ideation process. 5:00 – Geoff joins the podcast and gives an overview of his remit at LSEG. 7:00 – Then, he explains what has changed since LSEG acquired Refinitiv and how that expands the coverage area of LSEG Labs. 9:00 – Geoff walks through some examples of innovation in post-trade and capital markets space. 11:30 – They discuss the ideation process at LSEG Labs. 14:30 – It’s about identifying ‘quick wins.’ 16:00 – Geoff talks about a recent project LSEG Labs built. 23:00 – Moving forward, LSEG Labs will prioritize projects in sustainable finance and digital assets. 27:00 – Fresh off the LSEG Labs AI/ML 2021 report, Geoff explains one of the key findings: deep learning is now the favored type of machine learning. 35:00 – They wrap up discussing innovation in Emea and Asia versus the US.

This week, Lou Maiuri, COO at State Street, joins Tony on the podcast to discuss State Street’s acquisition of Brown Brothers Harriman’s Investor Services business and the firm’s strategy beyond that. They also cover how firms can build interoperability within the organization and some of the challenges with the new landscape of working remotely. 6:00 – Lou joins the podcast and gives a breakdown of his responsibilities at State Street. 9:00 – Then, he details how State Street’s acquisition of Brown Brothers Harriman’s Investor Services business is really a consolidation deal with many plusses. 11:30 – BBH’s Investor Services business is “the god of small things.” 12:30 – Lou says the deal is strategic and is accretive to State Street’s strategy. 14:00 – They discuss how retaining talent and executing the integration is the next key step. 18:30 – Customers want technology that speaks the same language. 23:30 – It’s not a good model if customers don’t have choices. 32:30 – They close out talking about how rem

Happy Labor Day! This week on the podcast, Wei-Shen, and Tony discuss how Big Tech firms are eyeing more of the capital markets space and the roadblocks they may face. We talk about a recent column written by our very own Josephine Gallagher and some of the other Waters Wrap columns written by Tony. https://www.waterstechnology.com/buy-side-technology/7835481/a-tale-of-two-titans-microsoft-vs-bloomberg https://www.waterstechnology.com/topics/waters-wrap

Kris Hopkins, head of capital markets at SBI Digital Markets, the Singaporean subsidiary of SBI Digital Assets, joined the Waters Wavelength Podcast to talk about digital assets and why he thinks capital markets firms should get more involved. 2:00 Kris joins the podcast and talks about how he started his career as an intern at the London International Financial Futures and Options Exchange. 4.30 How is the capital markets dealing with digital assets today? He says these new asset classes will have to ingrain themselves in the traditional institutions at some point. 7.30 Kris discusses why he decided to join SBI Digital. 12:30 Digital assets are not all about crypto. The challenge is that people generally think it is. 13:00 Another angle is asset tokenization, which can be compelling for capital markets firms. 16:00 Security token offerings are regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore. That gives people and organizations a wider range of investment opportunities to look into. 22:00 One of the challe

This week, Wei-Shen and Tony discuss climate change and how it will accelerate climate migration. Then, Shen gives a breakdown of her journey back to Hong Kong and how the early days of quarantine have been

The pandemic has been a lot about “glow ups” and, equally, “glow downs” on a social and individual level. This week, Wei-Shen and Tony discuss how Covid-19 impacted our usual habits, from working out in the mornings to having a better sleep schedule. With many of us still experiencing a languishing blend of work/gym/home life, how do we get back on track and form better habits? How do we come out of this? And, can companies help in any way? Yes, they can. Sure, there are limits to what (and how much) they can do to help, but every little gesture counts. How can they instill positivity in their staff?