Thursday, June 5, 2025

Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square Sells $1.05bn Stake

Growing plant step with coin money

Pershing Square Holdings, noted that Pershing Square Capital Management, L.P. (“PSCM”), which serves as PSH’s investment manager, announced a sale to strategic investors of a 10% common equity interest in Pershing Square Holdco, L.P., a newly formed limited partnership that owns 100% of PSCM.

In connection with the transaction, PSCM is completing an internal reorganisation of its ownership structure (the “Reorganisation”) resulting in the voting securities of Pershing Square being indirectly owned by a limited liability company (“the LLC”), an entity which is controlled by senior management of Pershing Square including Bill Ackman who is the largest shareholder of the LLC.

Although PSCM will remain the Company’s investment manager and its counterparty under the Investment Management Agreement (the “IMA”), the Reorganisation will result in a deemed assignment of PSH’s IMA for the purposes of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, which requires the consent of the PSH board. The PSH board has agreed to approve the deemed assignment of the IMA in accordance with the terms of the IMA and PSH’s Articles of Incorporation since it will have no impact on PSCM’s management team and its role in managing PSH, and PSCM’s obligations under the IMA will be unchanged.

The text of PSCM’s release is set forth below:

Pershing Square Capital Management, L.P. Announces Sale

of 10% Common Equity Interest for $1.05 Billion to Strategic Investors

Pershing Square Establishes Independent Board of Directors

New York, June 3, 2024 //- Pershing Square Capital Management, announced the primary sale of a 10% common equity interest in Pershing Square Holdco, L.P. (“Pershing Square”) – a newly formed limited partnership that owns 100% of PSCM – for a purchase price of $1.05 billion to a consortium of strategic investors including Arch Capital Group Ltd., BTG Pactual, Consulta Limited, ICONIQ Investment Management, Menora Mivtachim Holdings, an international group of family offices, and other investors.

“We are delighted to invite a group of world-class, long-term partners as investors in our business, which has been entirely owned by Pershing Square employees since our inception more than 20 years ago,” said Pershing Square Founder and CEO Bill Ackman. He continued: “This new investment will help accelerate our growth in assets under management in existing and new strategies. As always, Pershing Square will remain intensely focused on generating high, long-term returns for our investors.”

Concurrent with the closing of the minority investment, Pershing Square has established an independent Board of Directors consisting of five independent directors and four affiliates of PSCM. The independent directors are Kerry Murphy Healey, President Emerita of Babson College; Orion Hindawi, Executive Chairman of Tanium; Marco Kheirallah, partner at Lumina Capital; Nicholas Lamotte, Executive Chairman of Consulta; and Christine Todd, Chief Investment Officer of Arch Capital Group. The affiliate directors are Bill Ackman, Chairman and CEO; Ryan Israel, CIO; Nick Botta, Vice Chairman; and Halit Coussin, Chief Legal Officer.

In connection with the transaction, PSCM is completing an internal reorganization of its ownership structure (the “Reorganization”) which will result in the voting securities of Pershing Square being indirectly owned by a limited liability company (“the LLC”), an entity which will be controlled by senior management of Pershing Square including Bill Ackman who is the largest shareholder of the LLC.

The Reorganization will result in a deemed assignment under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, but will not affect PSCM’s provision of investment management services to the funds managed by PSCM. The purpose of the reorganization is a technical one, that is, to minimize the likelihood of any future deemed assignment, an issue that was important to resolve in connection with the strategic sale transaction. In connection with the Reorganization, each of PSCM’s funds, including Pershing Square Holdings, Ltd., approved the deemed assignment of its Investment Management Agreement. The approval of the assignment will have no impact on PSCM’s management team and its role in managing the Pershing Square funds.

Also, in conjunction with today’s announcement, Ben Hakim has been appointed as President of PSCM in addition to his continuing role as a member of the Investment Team. Mr. Hakim, a Partner at Pershing Square, joined the Investment Team in 2012 following 13 years at The Blackstone Group where he was a Senior Managing Director. Nick Botta will become Vice Chairman of PSCM and join the Pershing Square board. He previously served as President of PSCM.

BofA Securities, Citigroup, Evolve, Jefferies, and UBS Investment Bank served as placement agents, and Sullivan & Cromwell LLP and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP served as legal advisors to PSCM on the transaction. Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP served as legal advisor to the U.S. placement agents on the transaction.

Kerry Murphy Healey

Kerry Murphy Healey is President Emerita of Babson College and a lecturer at Princeton University, School of International and Public Affairs. Healey serves as an independent director and Chairperson of the Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility Committee of the Apollo Global Management Inc. (NYSE: APO) Board of Directors. She is also a director and Chairperson of the Governance Committee for Marti Technologies (NYSE: MRT). Dr. Healey served as an independent director of the Apollo Asset Management, Inc. Board from March 2021 through December 2021.

Dr. Healey was the inaugural president of the Milken Center for Advancing the American Dream in Washington, DC, from 2019-2022. Dr. Healey served as the President of Babson College from 2013-2019. Before coming to Babson, she served with distinction as the 70th lieutenant governor of Massachusetts from 2003 to 2007, where she worked to lead, enact, and implement a wide range of policy and legislative initiatives for the Romney-Healey Administration. In 2008, Dr. Healey was appointed by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as a founding member of the Executive Committee of the U.S. State Department’s Public-Private Partnership for Justice Reform in Afghanistan (PJRA), a position to which she was later reappointed by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Prior to her public service, Dr. Healey worked for more than a decade as a public policy consultant to the United States Department of Justice for Cambridge-based think tank Abt Associates. Dr. Healey holds an AB in government from Harvard College and a PhD in political science and law from Trinity College, Dublin. She has been a fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics and Harvard’s Center for Public Leadership. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission, and a trustee of the American University of Afghanistan and the American University of Bahrain.

Orion Hindawi

Orion Hindawi is the Executive Chairman and former CEO of Tanium, a private venture-backed endpoint management and cyber security company. Orion co-founded Tanium in 2007 and serves as its executive chairman. Orion drives the strategic vision and technical innovation at Tanium, as well as engagement with its strategic partners and customers. A technology visionary and accomplished inventor, Orion has led the development of enterprise-scale endpoint security and management platforms for the past 18 years at BigFix, Inc. (acquired by IBM in 2010) and Tanium, in addition to holding multiple software patents in network communications and systems management. Orion works closely every day with Tanium customers in pursuit of inventing new approaches for solving the significant challenges IT departments face securing and managing large, global enterprise environments.

Marco Kheirallah

Marco Kheirallah is a founding partner at Lumina Capital, a special situations investment firm founded in 2022 in Brazil. Prior to Lumina beginning in 2010, he was the Founder and Managing Partner at SIP Capital Fund. Marco also served as the Chief Financial Officer at PDG Realty from 2012 to 2015. Marco was a Partner at Banco Pactual from 2001 to 2009 and at Banco Matrix from 1996 to 2001. He also served as a Trader at Banco Opportunity from 1994 to 1996 and at Banco BCN from 1992 to 1994. Marco received his bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Fundação Getulio Vargas, EAESP.

Nicholas Lamotte

Nicholas Lamotte is the Executive Chairman of Consulta Limited, a value-oriented investment firm. Mr. Lamotte was appointed Executive Chairman in 2024, having served as Chairman of the Board since 2019. From 2008 to 2019, Mr. Lamotte served in various roles at Consulta, including Chief Executive Officer and Executive Chairman. Prior to joining Consulta, Mr. Lamotte was an analyst at Halcyon Asset Management from 2006 to 2008 and an analyst at Goldman Sachs from 2005 to 2006. Mr. Lamotte received a Bachelor of Arts from Brown University, where he graduated magna cum laude and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. Mr. Lamotte has completed the Owner/President Management program at Harvard Business School and has endowed the Nicholas M. Lamotte Scholarship for Business, Entrepreneurship and Organizations at Brown University.

Christine Todd

Christine Todd is Executive Vice President, Chief Investment Officer of Arch Capital Group Ltd. and President of Arch Investment Management Ltd. She joined Arch in June 2021 and has responsibility for setting the firm’s investment strategy and managing the day-to-day operations of the investment portfolio. Prior to joining Arch, Ms. Todd was Head of Fixed Income, U.S., for Amundi US from February 2019 to May 2021. She has also held executive roles at Neighborly Investments; Standish Mellon Asset Management Company LLC; and Gannett, Welsh & Kotler. She is a Chartered Financial Analyst and holds a B.A. from Georgetown University and an MBA from Boston University.

Source: Pershing Square

Shifting the Landscape: How Our 2024 Conference Title Points to the Present and Future of STA

Jim Hyde, NYSE Group
James (Jim) Hyde Head Shot May 25,2022 Photo Credit: NYSE

By Jim Hyde, NYSE

2024 STA Chair

As this year’s STA Chair, I am very pleased to announce the theme of our 91st Annual Market Structure Conference: Shifting the Landscape.

Shifting the Landscape is an appropriate theme for our flagship event as our industry responds to the typical and atypical forces that impact our market structure. Regulatory agendas and new innovations that promote investment activity and disrupt entrenched business models are a daily occurrence for us. However, today these influences are more ambitious and powerful than what we have encountered in the past. With a Presidential election at the backdrop of a wide and once-in-a-generation range of geopolitical events, Shifting the Landscape illustrates where we are as an industry, and the imperative need for proactive adaption.

Set for September 18-20 at the JW Marriott Grande Lakes Orlandothis year’s event promises to be our most exciting yet! In addition to hosting an outstanding group of broker-dealers, exchanges, buy-side firms, regulators and solution providers, we are thrilled to offer an array of new opportunities to make the most of your time while at the conference. The sprawling Grande Lakes Orlando property, which will allow for a Golf Tournament at the esteemed Ritz-Carlton Golf Club and poolside networking events that fit seamlessly alongside our regular program, will enable us to do exactly that.

As we start to build out the program, you can expect that this year’s conference will be organized under the same guiding principles as in the past: best content, best networking and best value. 

To those sponsors who have already committed to sponsor STA in 2024, a sincere Thank You! We are grateful to earn your support. Each level of sponsorship comes with complimentary registrations. If you don’t see your company’s name listed below among the 78 organizations that have already sponsored, contact us today!

So mark your calendars and save the date for the market structure event of 2024. We look forward to welcoming everyone in Orlando, Florida, quite literally a new landscape, as we host three days of content and networking.

Conference registration and the JW Marriott room block will open in late June, but sponsorships are available now!

Until then, enjoy your Summer! 

ON THE MOVE: UBS Americas Names Rob Karofsky; Chris Knight to LMAX

Rob Karofsky

Rob Karofsky has been named President UBS Americas and Co-President Global Wealth Management. He successfully led the UBS Investment Bank as Co-President since 2018 and as President since 2021. George Athanasopoulos and Marco Valla have become Co-Presidents of the Investment Bank and join UBS Group Executive Board (GEB). In addition, Damian Vogel to succeed Christian Bluhm as Group Chief Risk Officer and join GEB. Finally, Stefan Seiler, Head Group Human Resources and Corporate Services, to expand remit to include Group Communications and Branding.

Chris Knight

LMAX Group, an operator of institutional exchanges for FX and digital assets trading, has appointed Chris Knight to the role of Managing Director. He will be relocating from Sydney to London and will take up the role over the summer. Knight is an experienced financial markets professional having spent over 30 years in capital markets and FX and brings with him an extensive global network of institutional client and industry relationships. His distinguished career includes serving eight years as APAC Head of Distribution and Liquidity Optimisation at XTX Markets and over ten years at Standard Chartered Bank. 

Taryn Siglain

State Street Corporation has appointed Taryn Siglain to head of Financing Solutions. Siglain joined State Street in early 2023 as Global Head of Prime Services. Prior to joining State Street, she spent 15 years at Morgan Stanley, most recently as Head of Americas Secured Funding Trading and Collateral Optimization.

Northern Trust has appointed Chandra Dhandapani to its Board of Directors. Dhandapani is currently a senior advisor at CBRE Group. She previously served as Chief Executive Officer of the firm’s Global Workplace Solutions (GWS) business segment. Before joining CBRE, Dhandapani was a senior technology executive at Capital One Financial where she spent 17 years in various roles in technology, marketing & analytics, and operations.

ISITC, the industry trade organization connecting global financial services experts, has formed a new Executive Leadership Committee (ELC). The inaugural members include: Erica Borghi, former ISITC Chair of the Board and currently Partner at EMR Consulting Partners; Jason Brasile, Vice President in the Product Management group at State Street; Jocelyn Flaherty, Director of Business Event Marketing for DTCC; and Lisa Iagatta, Director of Operations at WisdomTree.

Anne Pointet will become BNP Paribas’ Head of Company Engagement on July 1 2024, succeeding Antoine Sire. Elise Hermant, Head of Communications at BNP Paribas, will also join the Executive Committee, now reporting directly to the General Management.

Citadel Securities has announced that that Jim Esposito, a former cohead of the global banking and capital markets group at Goldman Sachs, is set to join the company as president in September, according to Business Insider.

The Board of the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) has re-elected CFTC Chairman Rostin Behnam as a Vice Chair for the term 2024-2026, a role to which he was originally elected in October 2022.

If you have a new job or promotion to report, let me know at alyudvig@marketsmedia.com

Nasdaq Collaborates With Microsoft on the Boardroom Experience

Nasdaq’s Capital Access Platforms division has introduced new artificial intelligence powered capabilities for the Nasdaq Boardvantage Board Portal on Microsoft Azure.

These capabilities, powered by Microsoft Azure OpenAI Service, are designed to help governance teams quickly summarize board materials, which can help to highlight crucial information and provide strategic insights and actionable recommendations.

This may not only equip board members with essential information for informed decision-making, but also help governance teams with time and cost savings, so they can focus on vital board initiatives.

Jeff Thomas

“The future of the boardroom is at an inflection point – board members are facing ever-evolving pressures and are expected to manage increasing risks and responsibilities with historically limited technological support,” said Jeff Thomas, Executive Vice President of Nasdaq’s Corporate Platforms business.

“The document summarization capability is the first of a series of planned AI-enabled offerings for Nasdaq Boardvantage customers as we bring an intelligent layer to the board portal and reflects our commitment to empowering boards to navigate the complexities of corporate governance and redefine what’s possible through integrated solutions. Our collaboration with Microsoft allows us to unlock greater business insights, accelerate innovation and optimize operational excellence for our clients.”

Nasdaq survey found board members are looking to technology for new ways to be more efficient and data-informed, with 84% of respondents indicating that they expected increased or sustained scrutiny and time requirements for board service.

Nasdaq expects that the integration of generative AI into Nasdaq Boardvantage will help automate historically cumbersome and manual governance processes – such as summarizing reports, presentations and agendas – and enable directors to be better prepared for meetings.

“We are excited to collaborate with Nasdaq on innovative, AI-powered solutions to better serve its clients around the world,” said Judson Althoff, executive vice president and chief commercial officer at Microsoft.

“By migrating its board portal application Nasdaq Boardvantage to the Microsoft Cloud, Nasdaq is able to unlock new generative AI experiences—including a document summarization capability built on Azure OpenAI Service — to help board members increase efficiency of communications and gain insights for more informed decision-making.”

Nasdaq Governance Solutions is used by nearly half of Fortune 100 clients across more than 4,500 organizations. As part of the collaboration with Microsoft, Nasdaq is migrating its Nasdaq Boardvantage platform onto the Microsoft cloud so that all its customers can take advantage of the new generative AI capabilities. Nasdaq Boardvantage on Azure is currently available for customers in Asia and is being rolled out in North America now with plans to roll out to other geographies in the future.

42.5% of Fraud Attempts Detected Use AI, Finds Report

Signicat has announced a new report on the growing threat of AI-driven identity fraud in partnership with independent consultancy Consult Hyperion.

The research reveals that fraud prevention decision-makers across Europe are experiencing more AI-driven identity fraud and expect it to grow, but are unprepared to tackle it, and haven’t been able to implement measures to prevent it yet.

The Battle against AI-driven Identity Fraud is the first study into how organisations across Europe are battling the growing threat of AI-driven identity fraud.

It asks banks, insurance providers, payment providers and fintechs about their experience, how AI is changing fraud, and whether they are prepared to fight it.

Over a thousand fraud decision-makers across Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, and the UK took part in the research.

Key findings include:

Rise of deepfakes: Three years ago, AI was being used to create new or synthetic identities and forgeries of documents. Today AI is being used more extensively and at scale for deepfakes and social engineering attacks.

A third of AI-driven fraud attempts are successful: 42.5% of fraud attempts detected use AI, as estimated by respondents, with 29% of them considered to be successful. One in nine said that estimated AI usage in fraud attempts is as high as 70% for their organisation. 38% of revenue loss to fraud is estimated to be due to AI-driven attacks.

Account takeovers in B2B: Despite account takeover generally being seen as a consumer issue, it is actually the most common fraud type for B2B organisations.

Confusion on how to combat: Fraud decision-makers recognise that AI will drive nearly all future identity fraud. However, there is confusion and limited understanding about its exact nature, impact, and the best prevention technologies.

Plans but little action: Over three-quarters of businesses have teams dedicated to the issue of AI-driven identity fraud, are upgrading their fraud prevention technology, and expect increased budgets. However, less than a quarter have begun implementing measures.

At an inflection point

AI is not yet making fraud materially more successful—at least, not yet. Success rates for fraud attempts, both AI-driven and not, have remained steady over the last three years. And that is why we are at an inflection point.

AI is enabling more sophisticated fraud, at a greater scale than ever seen before. Fraud is likely to be more successful, but even if success rates stay steady, the sheer volume of attempts means that fraud levels are set to explode.

There has been a shift in the last three years, from creating new accounts using forged credentials, to compromising accounts that already exist. Signicat’s research reveals that account takeover attacks are the most popular type of fraud, often taking advantage of weak or reused passwords. Deepfakes, often used to impersonate the holder of an account rather than creating a new or synthetic identity, are far more popular, accounting for one in 15 fraud attempts. Fraudsters are happy to evolve and attack where they see vulnerabilities.

Understood yet unprepared

There is a very high awareness of the problem of AI-driven identity fraud. Most fraud decision-makers agreed that AI is a major driver of identity fraud (73%), that AI will enable almost all identity fraud in the future (74%), and that AI will mean more people will fall victim to fraud than ever before (74%). Organisations do, at least understand the threat that AI poses in its ability to make identity fraud easier, more accessible, and work at scale. They can detect AI in the attacks they face, and they understand that the problem is only going to get worse.

However, organisations are unprepared for the threat. They do not know what techniques and technologies will help them the most, and their plans to fight back are just that: plans, with implementation timescales mostly in the next twelve months. Even more worrisome is that organisations report that the deck is stacked against them: they lack budget, expertise and time.

Asger Hattel

“Fraud has always been one of our customers’ biggest concerns, and AI-driven fraud is now becoming a new threat to them. It now represents the same amount of successful attempts as general fraud, and it is more successful if we look at revenue loss,” said Asger Hattel, CEO at Signicat.

“AI is only going to get more sophisticated from now on. While our research shows that fraud prevention decision-makers understand the threat, they need the expertise and resources necessary to prevent it from becoming a major threat. A key part of this will be the use of layered AI-enabled fraud prevention tools, to combat these threats with the best technology offers.”

“It is essential that financial firms have a robust strategy for AI-driven identity fraud. Identity is the first line of defence,” said David Birch, Director, Consult Hyperion, “Identity systems must be able to resist and adapt to ever-changing fraud tactics, to protect legitimate customers and ensure the reputation of the service.”

Understanding the need for layered defences by organisations, Signicat offers digital identity solutions that are orchestrated securely and organized for both companies and end-users. From identity verification through various methods such as automated user identity verification or national digital identity schemes, to authentication and legally binding electronic signatures, Signicat covers the complete digital identity lifecycle. A layered approach been key to staying ahead of AI-driven fraud, Signicat also offers data enrichment and verification solutions, as well as ongoing identity monitoring to ensure that no fraud is committed after the customer sign-up process.

FLASH FRIDAY: Evaluating Access Fees Proposal

FLASH FRIDAY is a weekly content series looking at the past, present and future of capital markets trading and technology. FLASH FRIDAY is sponsored by Instinet, a Nomura company.

While the US equity markets are the most liquid and efficient markets in the world, they are also among the most regulated ones. In 2022 and 2023, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) made several proposals to change US market structure – order competition, tick size and access fee reforms, Rule 605 of Regulation NMS, best execution and volume-based pricing tiers at exchanges for agency and riskless principal trades. 

On March 6, 2024 the SEC adopted amendments to disclosure requirements under Rule 605. Now, heading into Q2 2024, US broker-dealers are anticipating another decision by the SEC, predicting that tick size and access fee reforms could be the next ones adopted. 

As such, a representative from BLOX Markets, building a trading platform geared towards retail investors, foresees that the Tick Size & Access fee proposal will likely be “the next retail equity market structure rule to be adopted”. This anticipation is based on the comments provided by the SEC during the Bloomberg Equities Market Structure conference last week, and BLOX Markets anticipates adoption in Q2 based on feedback from the street.

Joe Saluzzi

The Commission proposed to reduce the existing cap on fees to access exchange quotes from $0.003 per share, or “30 mils” to $0.001, or “10 mils”, for almost all stocks. And the majority of commenters addressing access fees support a reduction in the access fee cap.

Joe Saluzzi, Partner, Co-Founder and Co-Head of Equity Trading at Themis Trading, said: “We support the lowering of access fees and believe that this change will be a win for long-term investors.” 

Since Reg NMS was enacted in 2007, the major exchanges have been subsidizing low quality liquidity which often disappears whenever there is the potential for adverse selection, he said. 

According to Saluzzi, reducing access fees will cause rebates to be reduced which should decrease the amount of low-quality liquidity. “Access fee reduction should have the added benefit of eliminating some complex order types and low-cost order routing strategies,” he said.

“Either way we look at it, this proposal should benefit the long-term investor,” he stressed.

Derrick Chan, Head of Equities at Fidelity Institutional, added: “We strongly support regulatory initiatives that result in better outcomes for investors, drive competition, and lead to more efficient markets.” 

He noted that access fees must be looked at within the context of all of the SEC’s market structure proposals, “because they are all deeply intertwined”. 

“I do not see access fees being a big issue for the equity markets. Broadly speaking, the current 30 mil access fee cap helps improve liquidity and quoted spreads for investors,” he said.

“At the same time, we support a reduction in access fees in certain segments of the market that is commensurate with a targeted reduction in tick sizes for stocks that are tick constrained,” Chan said. 

For example, he said, if the minimum quoting increment for tick constrained NMS securities trading at or above $1/share is lowered to 50 mils (from current 1 cent), “we think that the access fee should be halved, or reduced from the current fee of 30 mils under 1 cent to 15 mils under a 50-mil tick”.

Derrick Chan

Chan said that his primary concern is around a broad reduction to the access fee, which could “harm liquidity and widen spreads with little clear benefit”. 

“Similarly, while the access fee reduction may seem to lower costs, I don’t see a direct benefit to retail investors who already receive an effective spread on marketable orders that is much tighter than the quoted spread and typically free of charge – neither of which would be expected to change under the SEC’s proposal,” he said.

According to Chan, if the SEC’s access fee changes are adopted as proposed, institutional brokers who provide cost plus pricing to their customers will likely be insulated from the fee changes aside from some increases in billing complexity. 

“However, institutional brokers who provide all in commission pricing could see their costs go down,” he said.

“The main benefit I see is when paired with a targeted reduction in tick sizes for tick-constrained names from 1 cent to 0.5 cents, it would prevent potentially distortive trading dynamics, like locked or crossed markets,” Chan said. 

A reduction in access fees is also likely to lower fees for institutional brokers whose customers are net takers of liquidity, he added.

Saluzzi said that volumes that have been lost to off-exchange venues may migrate back to the lit exchanges since these exchanges will now be more competitively priced.

However, rather than just a reduction in access fees, Themis Trading would also have preferred to see an elimination of rebates, Saluzzi said. “We think a flat take/take fee model would have been a better proposal,” he said. 

“This model would ensure exchanges still get compensated fairly for the service provided while at the same time eliminate most order routing conflicts,” he added.

If brokers are following best execution guidelines, they should not be affected by this change, Saluzzi said. “Brokers should be agnostic to access fees/rebates and should route to the venue where they will receive best execution,” he said.

Benefits and Concerns

Jeff O’Connor, Liquidnet’s Head of Market Structure and Co-head of Coverage, Americas, said that the cap of access fees can effectively lower the fees exchanges receive for matching orders at auction to levels below the payment wholesalers make to brokerages in exchange for execution of their retail volume.  

“This reduction in margins could lead to the exit of SDP participation, removing the current structure of zero commission trading and accessibility/liquidity and guaranteed execution for the retail participant,” he said.

Jeff O’Connor

According to O’Connor, the spirit of the proposal is to enhance competition, but forcing the hand of industry participants to adopt a system that prevents market forces determining the cost of executing a trade, can be argued as anti-competitive. 

He noted that the retail trader currently enjoys zero commission trading, obtainable markets, unlimited size in 10,000+ listed stocks and ETF’s, at prices that are better than institutions receive.  

“Adding complexity and regulation threatens to hurt the retail participant, and the larger the forced reduction in access fees, the larger the lost presence of the retail wholesalers will impact execution quality and liquidity,” he argued.

O’Connor pointed out that broker-dealers route, or should route, in a price agnostic fashion. “Through a host of execution quality metrics, a broker dealers’ routing is based on their constant review of the best venue partners – offering a mix of both liquidity and performance,” he said.  

“Data/analysis offers transparent performance of a venue (exchanges, ATS’s), and if a venue is underperforming, the spigot is reduced until ultimately closed altogether,” he said.

According to O’Connor, it is always in the best interest of a venue to outperform its peers because that behavior will produce more flow.  

“A reduction in access fees will not change this analysis and the better venues will rise to the top,” he said.

The proposed equity market structure changes could narrow spreads resulting in reduced profitability for wholesale market makers, said the representative from BLOX Markets.

“If wholesale market makers presently receive top-tier rebates of about 30 mils from US exchanges, a potential reduction to 10 mils or 5 mils tomorrow could negatively impact their profits, or the rebate passed on to the end broker,” said the representative from BLOX Markets.

“If the profits of the wholesale market makers are negatively impacted because of reduced spreads, this could disrupt the payment for order flow (PFOF) relationship with retail brokers.”

“The proposed equity market structure changes may strain the payment for order flow (PFOF) relationship between wholesale market makers and retail brokers, potentially leading to increased competition for retail order flow, aligning with the fundamental objectives of the SEC,” stated the representative from BLOX Markets.

Chan further said it is hard to know exactly where the SEC will end up on this topic, but brokers can review their technology, risk controls, pricing models and trading strategies to see if they are able to adapt to evolving access fee thresholds.

“Depending on the scope of the rules that are finalized, investor education may be required to ensure that customers are reasonably able to operate under the new rules,” he said. 

“This is less directly impactful to retail for changes to access fees but will have significant impact if other proposals such as tick sizes and round lot reforms are adopted,” he concluded.

Best M&A Deal: SimCorp – Axioma

Traders Magazine spoke with Christian Kromann, Chief Executive Officer of SimCorp, who won Best M&A Deal at the 2024 Markets Choice Awards.

Christian Kromann

Please tell us about SimCorp and your capabilities?

SimCorp is a provider of technology and services to the investment management industry.

Through SimCorp One, our new integrated platform encompassing our complete suite of software and services, we cover the entire workflow from the front office to the back office, including data management and client reporting. By providing a total view of the portfolio across public and private markets on the same platform, we give investment professionals the insights they need to make informed and confident decisions for their total portfolio management.

Just as a pilot has all flight instruments and controls at their fingertips, our clients want their trade orders, compliance information and risk analytics consolidated into one single solution, like a cockpit.

As an end-to-end SaaS (Software as a Service) platform with cloud native technology, SimCorp One delivers that experience for our clients. SimCorp One is built for every type of operating model a client could choose, which allows the client to differentiate from peers and reflect their own investment identity.

How do SimCorp and Axioma complement each other?

Axioma is an established market leader in portfolio optimization and risk management analytics. Combined with SimCorp’s leading technology platform and broader capabilities, together we provide a powerful and fully integrated offering across the entire investment management value chain. Axioma is now a product brand within SimCorp, and we have created a detailed roadmap to not only continuously enhance our offerings, but also to create the next generation of portfolio management tools.

From a geographical point of view, with the addition of Axioma, SimCorp has significantly increased its presence in North America, which is a top priority. SimCorp’s strong presence in EMEA and APAC provide considerable untapped potential for Axioma.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, SimCorp and Axioma share strong values and a laser-focus on delivering exceptional outcomes for clients. I’m extremely excited about we can deliver for clients as one team.

What is SimCorp’s most recent accomplishment?

Our most recent accomplishment is the introduction of our integrated platform, SimCorp One, which we launched in April at our largest-ever global client conference in London. While the platform is new, it’s based on more than 50 years of innovation of providing software and services to the buy side.

SimCorp One includes Dimension, Axioma, Client Comms, Data Management, Business Services and Partner Products connected to the industry leading IBOR.

What challenges do you see in the industry?

The investment management industry is facing cost pressures. To differentiate themselves, firms are expanding into more asset classes and instruments than ever before. Consequently, almost every client, whether new or existing, are reassessing their operating models and reviewing how they can set themselves up for success.

This is often driven by strategic reviews at the executive level, where there is a heightened focus on technology compared to a few years ago, and how they can leverage it to its fullest potential to drive operational efficiency to meet this challenge.

We believe that financial institutions need simplification from their technology partners, and the introduction of SimCorp One is our way of providing this simplicity. This is because their industry has become more complex over the past several years, leading to operational pressure and produced an overwhelming amount of data and decision points.

What is the need for market solutions that streamline operational efficiencies?

In the 2024 Global InvestOps Report, 200 buy-side executives ranked improving operational efficiency as their top priority guiding technology and operations investments. This marks a significant increase from one year earlier, when it ranked fifth.

AI is a key technology driving operational efficiency. We’ve introduced an AI Copilot into our Client Communications offering, and we’re committed to integrating AI across our products and services where it can improve operational efficiency.

We’re also releasing a Portfolio Manager AI Copilot, which will offer real-time analytics of investment strategies to enhance decision-making capabilities with just a few clicks.

ACA to Acquire the Broker-Dealer Distribution Business from UMB Fund Services

ACA Group (ACA), a provider of governance, risk, and compliance solutions to clients in the financial services industry, has announced its intent to acquire the broker-dealer distribution business from UMB Fund Services, a subsidiary of UMB Financial Corporation.

The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2024. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

“We are excited about the opportunities this acquisition brings to our strategic growth vision alongside the ability to expand our market presence and deliver exceptional value to our clients and stakeholders,” shared Patrick Olson, Chief Executive Officer at ACA.

Patrick Olson

ACA’s distribution division, ACA Foreside, is the industry’s largest third-party distributor by number of funds, currently distributing and servicing $2 trillion in assets across hundreds of fund families.

The lift out of UMB’s distribution business expands ACA Foreside’s internal distribution team, co-led by Teresa Cowan and Chris Lanza, and will include the addition of asset management clients with mutual fund, exchange-traded fund (ETF), and closed-end fund products.

The transaction will introduce over $48 billion in client assets to ACA and allow current UMB clients the ability to leverage ACA’s expansive advisory support and industry-leading technology.

“We are thrilled to announce this acquisition, which is a pivotal moment in our journey to continue redefining the landscape of financial services. This strategic action underscores our commitment to innovation and positions us to better serve these clients with a comprehensive suite of compliance and technology solutions,” said Chris Lanza, Partner and Co-head of ACA Foreside.

ACA Foreside will be responsible for legal underwriting services, marketing material review, registered representative licensing and supervision, negotiating and maintaining broker-dealer selling agreements, and more. This would be ACA’s sixth acquisition in the past three years.

“This transaction supports our efforts to focus on our core competencies and continue strategically growing our fund administration, fund accounting and transfer agency business,” said Maureen Quill, Executive Vice President, Executive Director for Registered Funds of UMB Fund Services.

“We will continue to service many of these clients through our core lines of business and look forward to maintaining and growing those relationships. We are confident our clients will have a smooth and seamless transition for distribution services through both UMB’s and ACA Foreside’s continued focus on delivering best-in-class service.”

CME Group U.S. Treasury Complex Surpasses Record 34 Million Contracts

CME Group, the world’s leading derivatives marketplace, has announced that volume in its deeply liquid U.S. Treasury complex set a new record of 34,350,339 contracts traded on May 28, surpassing the previous record of 33,322,608 contracts on November 27, 2023.

Agha Mirza

“Investors seeking to navigate historic levels of debt issuance and persistent uncertainty are turning to our U.S. Treasury complex in record numbers to access the world’s most liquid, flexible and efficient risk management offerings,” said Agha Mirza, CME Group Global Head of Rates and OTC Products.

“In advance of the Treasury market move toward central clearing, we are also seeing new open interest records as our leading network of buy-side participants continues to grow and we explore more opportunities to extend cost savings across portfolios.” 

CME Group delivers the market’s leading electronic, central limit order book for every tenor of U.S. Treasury futures and options, which trade side-by-side on the CME Globex platform with BrokerTec cash securities.

In addition, clients benefit from the flexibility of privately negotiated transactions in the form of blocks, exchange for risk (EFR) and exchange of futures for physical (EFP) agreements.

These tools are used globally to manage risk for sovereigns, banks, asset managers, hedge funds, principal trading firms and other institutions.

U.S. Treasury futures and options receive automatic margin offsets against existing CME Group Interest Rate products, and are listed with, and subject to, the rules of CBOT.

These contracts are also eligible for portfolio margining against other cleared interest rate swaps, futures and options.

Source: CME Group

DTCC Comments On Industry’s T+1 Progress

Brian Steele, DTCC

Today, May 30, 2024, DTCC issued the following statement:

T+1 was introduced in the U.S. on Tuesday, May 28, and the industry has been operating on an accelerated settlement cycle since that time.

Affirmation Rates

Our analysis shows that as of yesterday, May 29, 94.55% of transactions were affirmed by the Depository Trust Company (DTC) cutoff time of 9:00PM ET on trade date. This represents a significant change from the affirmation rate observed at the end of January (73%).

When considering specific market segments as of end of day on May 29:

  • Prime Broker Affirmation Rate: 98.6% (up from 81% in January)
  • Investment Manager Auto Affirmation (central match) Rate: 97.5% (up from 92% in January)
  • Custodian or Investment Manager (self) Affirmation Rate: 84.29% (up from 51% in January)
Brian Steele

Statement from Brian Steele, Managing Director, President, Clearing & Securities Services: “After working closely with the industry for over three years, we are pleased these efforts are driving a smooth transition, including very high same day affirmation rates, which increased to 94.55% yesterday. While we are proud of this progress, we will continue to collaborate with SIFMA, ICI and the industry to ensure a successful T+1 implementation in the coming days and weeks.”

Fail Rates

  • CNS Fail Rate: On May 29, the first day of T+1 settlement, the CNS Fail Rate was 1.90%. This is lower than the May average of 2.01% for T+2 settlements.
  • DTC Non-CNS Fails Rate: Similarly, on May 29, the DTC Non-CNS Fails Rate was 2.92%. This is lower than the May average of 3.24% for T+2 settlements.

Clearing Fund Impact

In a T+1 environment, the NSCC Clearing Fund decreased by US$3.7 Billion (29%) from the past quarter average value of US$12.8 Billion to US$9.1 Billion. The NSCC Clearing Fund decreased by US$3.1 billion (25%) from the past month average value of $12.2 billion in a T+2 environment to US$9.1 Billion.

Statement from Tim Cuddihy, Managing Director and Group Chief Risk Officer: “One of the key industry benefits of T+1 is the significant decrease in clearing fund requirements, which have decreased by around $4 billion – a significant reduction that is enhancing liquidity, increasing efficiency and mitigating risk for market participants.”

Source: DTCC

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