First Read
The Out of Options Motorcycle Club to Ride to Miami to Options Industry Conference
John Lothian News (JLN) by John Lothian
The Out of Options Motorcycle Club comes together to raise money by doing a charity motorcycle ride to the options conference. The group is riding for this year is the Babies Heart Fund, which supports the pediatric cardiology division at Columbia where ISE’s Molly McGregor’s son is a patient. She credits them with saving Nathan’s life and says the research they are doing now is simply amazing. The group is also riding for cancer research at St. Jude’s, an equally important cause and an amazing institution.
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***** I gave to both Babies Heart Fund and Futures for Kids yesterday. What can you do?
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Futures for Kids Support for Nepal
FFK support 2 kids charities in Nepal and we have been in contact and it’s terrible. We are making two emergency donations today which leaves the FFK coffers pretty empty. We need money so below is a way. If you can donate that’s great and either way please send around to all you know as this is a chance for our industry to react to events like these and the inevitable effect on children.
Thanks,
Patrick Thornton-Smith
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***DA: We are two short weeks away from FFK Day May 15. But don’t wait until then.
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UK “flash crash” trader fails to raise bail, stays behind bars
Reuters
The British trader fighting extradition to the United States on charges that he illegally contributed to the 2010 Wall Street “flash crash”, appeared in court on Wednesday and was ordered to be kept in custody after failing to meet his bail conditions.
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***** I have heard impassioned speeches from Chicago traders that Mr. Sarao did nothing wrong, yet he sits in jail without any “friends” bailing him out. Where are the brave rogues of the futures industry?
***** If you have a perspective on this case and wish to share it anonymously, please email me your thoughts (rant) and I will publish the best of the lot (anonymously). The regulators need to hear your thoughts on this. Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton used to publish important treatises of the day anonymously, or under a pseudonym. You can too and trust me to protect your identity.
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CME’s Duffy Sounds Off on Gov’t Handling of ‘Flash Crash’ Arrest
By Julia Limitone
CME CEO Terry Duffy is poking holes in the government’s case against trader Navinder Singh Sarao’s arrest in London last week for his alleged role in the ‘Flash Crash’ of May 6, 2010.
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***** Where do you shoot fish? In a barrel of course. The fish that are unaccounted for you can’t see or shoot. The consolidated audit trail for equities is a pipe dream, a very expensive pipe dream. Until equities can show up with real data, futures will continue to be the whipping boy because it is the fish in the barrel with a ready audit trail. What futures orders or trades was it that caused Accenture to trade to one penny? Let’s not turn a blind eye to the catastrophe that was equity trading on the day of the Flash Crash. I am not seeking to deflect attention away from the futures story involving Mr. Sarao, but would like to remind us that there is a much bigger story to what happened that day.
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We Thought Our Pay Would Be Higher, Wall Streeters Say in Poll
Bloomberg Business
Ask Main Street about Wall Street and you probably won’t hear this: Banker pay is surprisingly low. But that’s what financial professionals say. Asked whether they earn more or less than they expected when they decided to pursue a finance career, 48 percent of respondents in the Bloomberg Markets Global Poll say compensation is less or much less than they had hoped for.
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***** Work smarter, people.
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FIA Global Issues Recommendations on Central Clearing Risks
FIA
Today, FIA Global issued recommendations for assessing and managing risks that arise from central counterparty (CCP) clearing.
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***** But what does the FIA say about managing riot risk?
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Futures Industry Law Confab Canned Due To Baltimore Riots
By Ed Beeson, Law360
Law360, New York (April 28, 2015, 4:18 PM ET) — A top conference for futures and derivatives attorneys and compliance officers scheduled to begin this week in Baltimore was cancelled on Tuesday due to the rioting and government crackdowns that have followed the death of a man in police custody.
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****** They say “run for the hills!”
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Europe Unseats U.S. as Best Place to Invest in Bloomberg Poll
Bloomberg Business
Europe gets the nod as the best place to invest for the first time since at least 2009 in a Bloomberg survey of financial professionals, unseating the U.S. Thirty-five percent of those surveyed in the Bloomberg Markets Global Poll said the euro zone would be among the one or two markets offering investors the best opportunities over the next 12 months.
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****** I want to start a business in France. I have since I visited Paris last year. Still figuring it out, though Doug Ashburn has volunteered to man the office once his kids are out of the house.
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Veronica Augustsson makes top list of “Future Women Leaders 2015″
Cinnober
Cinnober’s CEO Veronica Augustsson has been designated as one of Sweden’s most successful young female managers. The organization behind “Future Women Leaders 2015″ is Ledarna, a Swedish managers’ association, in collaboration with talent partner Nova.
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***** Congratulations Veronica! Well deserved.
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MarketsWiki
MarketsWiki Page of the Day
Eris Exchange
MarketsWiki Recent Updates
People
Michael Bloomberg; Shelly Brown; Michael McClain; David Helps
Companies, Organizations and Groups
Eris Exchange; Bloomberg; Australian Securities Exchange
Products
Futures contract
Statistics
62,243,511 pages viewed, 8,175 articles, 191,315 edits
MarketsWiki Statistics
Lead Stories
The OCC looks to a bright confident day
FTSE Global Markets
This is a time in financial history when the post trade segment is truly coming into its own. Globally the segment is replete with institutions at a crossroads: some will fall by the wayside; some will be cowed by the change befalling the segment and dawdle in the doldrums and yet others will rise to the occasion. The US Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) is an institution that looks decidedly upwardly mobile. It has clearly validated its business model and even as it expects more leaders to enter the market place, it is looking to establish a more robust leadership role in the post trade services space, backed by enhanced risk procedures and liquidity. OCC executive chairman Craig Donohue spoke to FTSE Global Markets about the strategic imperatives now driving the corporation’s business.
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Navinder Singh Sarao And The Flash Crash: Why Financial Market ‘Spoofing’ Is So Hard To Catch –And Even Harder To Prosecute
By Owen Davis , IB Times
After a week in a London jail, Navinder Singh Sarao has become the unlikely symbol of the precarious state of American financial markets. The 36-year-old trader is challenging extradition to U.S. courts after his arrest last week on charges of manipulating stock futures prices. Meanwhile, the financial community continues to puzzle over astounding allegations that Sarao’s 2010 trading activity precipitated the Flash Crash, the wildest market gyration in financial history.
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Centralised risk raises systemic worries over derivatives
Philip Stafford, FT
Six years after the financial crisis exposed the systemic dangers of derivatives, the industry faces questions as to whether risk management systems will contain the next major bout of market turmoil.
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Nasdaq Takes Blame for Twitter’s Earnings Leak
By YOREE KOH and SAUMYA VAISHAMPAYAN , WSJ
Twitter TWTR -22.21% got a taste of its own broadcasting power today when a Web crawler found and shared its earnings on the social-media service nearly an hour before its intended release.
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After remaking CME, Donohue is at it again, at OCC
JOE CAHILL, Crain’s Chicago Business
Craig Donohue’s measured, lawyerly words make it easy to forget he’s once again at the center of turbulent change in Chicago’s exchange industry.
Yet that’s where he finds himself three years after retiring as CEO of CME Group, owner of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, Chicago Board of Trade and other trading venues. Now he’s running Options Clearing Corp., a once-obscure organization that guarantees, or “clears,” trades on the Chicago Board Options Exchange and other options markets.
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‘Flash crash’ trader remains in jail after second court appearance
Jane Croft, Law Courts Correspondent, FT
Navrinder Sarao at his first appearance at Westminster Magistrates Court
The trader accused of playing a role in the “flash crash” of 2010 has appeared for a second time before a London court after he failed to raise £5.05m bail.
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Barclays sets aside further £800m to cover forex probes
Martin Arnold, Banking Editor, FT
A Barclays sign outside a Barclays Plc bank branch on May 8, 2014 in London, England. Barclays announced yesterday that they will cut 14,000 jobs this year across the investment part of their company as part of a new strategy. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)©Getty
Barclays has put aside a further £800m to cover the cost of investigations into manipulation of foreign exchange markets, offsetting a rebound in its investment bank and cutting its quarterly net profits by more than half.
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Buy-siders back new swap futures venture
The Trade
Start-up swap futures trading venue GMEX has received backing from buy-side firms in the build up to its summer launch date.
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“Friends” Who Trade on Inside Information: How United States v. Newman Changes the Law
By: Jon Eisenberg, K & L Gates
In unsuccessfully seeking rehearing in United States v. Newman, 773 F.3d 438 (2d Cir. 2014), reh’g denied, Nos. 13-1837, 13-1917 (2d Cir. Apr. 3, 2015), the government acknowledged that the Second Circuit’s recent decision in Newman “will dramatically limit the Government’s ability to prosecute some of the most common, culpable, and market- threatening forms of insider trading,” and “arguably represents one of the most significant developments in insider trading law in a generation.”1 As we discuss below, Newman is a well-deserved generational setback for the government. It reflects the Second Circuit’s reasonable reaction to government overreach, and it establishes brighter lines to cabin prosecutorial and SEC discretion in bringing future criminal and civil insider trading actions.
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Regulatory
SEC Announces Award to Whistleblower in First Retaliation Case
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced a maximum whistleblower award payment of 30 percent of amounts collected in connection with In the Matter of Paradigm Capital Management, Inc. and Candace King Weir, File No. 3-15930 (June 16, 2014), the SEC’s first retaliation case. The whistleblower will receive over $600,000 for providing key original information that led to the successful SEC enforcement action. The whistleblower in this matter suffered unique hardships, including retaliation, as a result of reporting to the Commission.
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CFTC’s Global Markets Advisory Committee to Meet May 14, 2015
The meeting will focus on issues related to assessing clearinghouse safeguards and the CFTC’s proposal on the cross-border application of its margin requirements for uncleared swaps. The meeting will consist of two panels. The first panel will discuss clearinghouse capital contributions as well as clearinghouse stress testing. The second panel will discuss the CFTC’s proposal regarding cross-border application of its margin requirements for uncleared swaps.
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A regulatory spoof
Matthew C Klein, FT
If American regulators get their way, Navinder Singh Sarao will spend the rest of his life in prison for having done what generations of traders did before him: post bids and offers that he hoped wouldn’t get filled. Meanwhile, sell-siders who deliberately misled investors about the sorts of loans getting packaged into private-label MBS face little threat of jail, nor do the traders who manipulated Libor. This is not the way to restore investor confidence in the markets.
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Wealth Adviser: SEC Looks at Merrill’s Compliance with Customer-Protection Rules
by Kevin Noblet , WSJ
Regulators are looking into whether Merrill Lynch broke rules designed to ensure that customers of the Bank of America-owned brokerage would have access to enough of their money in a crisis. The rules require financial firms that handle customer trades to calculate their net liabilities to clients at least once a week. The more they owe to clients, the more they need to set aside in available cash and securities. However, for at least three years, Merrill used large, complex trades and loans to save tens of millions of dollars a year in costs and to free up billions of dollars it might have otherwise needed to put in reserves, The Wall Street Journal reports. Bank of America says it always complied with the rules, and that the unusual strategy, initiated before the bank bought Merrill in 2008, was stopped in 2012.
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IOSCO: Emerging Market Regulators Aim For Deeper And More Resilient Capital Markets
MondoVisione
Global emerging capital market regulators met in Cairo this week and reinforced their commitment to maintain market resilience while focusing on efforts to accelerate the sustainable growth and development of emerging capital markets.
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EU warns of cybersecurity risks to financial stability
MLex
The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission will consider whether to set up an industry self-policing organization for swaps market participants alone, Commissioner Sharon Bowen said. http://jlne.ws/1KcP0Fc
Assessing the impact of post-financial crisis regulation
Cyrus Amir-Mokri, Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom LLP via Lexology
The financial crisis of 2008 demonstrated that the then-existing financial regulatory system was in need of substantial repair. By any measure, the financial regulatory reform that has followed has been extensive. In areas such as capital and liquidity, derivatives, resolution planning and consumer protection, the change has been sweeping. In the United States, the Dodd-Frank Act itself mandated the regulatory agencies to write almost 400 rules. That number does not include the rules based on international agreements such as the Basel accords on capital and liquidity.
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Self-Regulatory Organization (SRO) Rulemaking and National Market System (NMS) Plans
SEC
NASDAQ: Notice of Filing and Immediate Effectiveness of Proposed Rule Change Relating to Fees, Dues and Other Charges (Release No. 34-74821; File No. SR-NASDAQ-2015-039); see also Exhibit 5
NASDAQ OMX BX: Notice of Filing and Immediate Effectiveness of Proposed Rule Change by NASDAQ OMX BX, Inc. Relating to Fees, Dues and Other Charges (Release No. 34-74822; File No. SR-BX-2015-023); see also Exhibit 5
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Exchanges & Trading Facilities
CME loses bid to dismiss members’ case
By LYNNE MAREK, Crain’s Chicago Business
In a court battle instigated by some of its long-time futures exchange members, CME Group lost an early round today when a judge refused to dismiss the case.
Cook County Circuit Court Judge Mary Mikva ruled against the futures exchange operator by rejecting its motion to compel arbitration. Allowing arbitration would have sidelined the case.
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CME Europe CEO Vermaas eyes growth one year in
FOW
CME Europe’s chief executive has said the exchange has made good progress in its first year and is now focused on ramping up volumes in its existing contracts as well as forging ahead with its plan to build a “truly multi-asset derivatives exchange in the region”. CME Europe launched with FX contracts and biofuels on April 28 2014, marking the US futures giant’s first exchange outside of the US.
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GMEX IRS Constant Maturity Futures backed by leading asset management firms
Automated Trader
Global Markets Exchange Group (GMEX) have announced that a number of European asset management firms have declared their intention to trade the Euro-denominated Interest Rate Swap Constant Maturity Futures (CMF) contracts on GMEX Exchange via their prime brokers. These include Lyxor Asset Management and Old Mutual Global Investors.
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Nasdaq To Webcast 2015 Annual Shareholders Meeting
MondoVisione
Nasdaq (Nasdaq:NDAQ) will webcast its annual stockholders meeting live on Wednesday, May 6, 2015 at 9 a.m. Eastern Time from the Nasdaq MarketSite.
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HKEx held initial talks on possible Taiwan stock link-CEO
Reuters
Hong Kong’s stock exchange held initial talks with Taiwan about a possible stock market link, its chairman said on Wednesday, a scheme that would potentially allow investors in both markets to directly cross-trade shares for the first time.
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Hedge Funds & Managed Futures
Goldman sees $1 trillion lift in 2015 via U.S. stock buybacks, dividends
BY CHUCK MIKOLAJCZAK, Reuters
Investors will rake in more than $1 trillion in 2015 as U.S. companies increase stock buybacks and boost dividends, Goldman Sachs Group Inc said, with benefits coming soon as many S&P 500 companies exit a blackout period for repurchases next week.
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Corvex Partner to Launch New Activist Fund
By LIZ HOFFMAN, WSJ
Corvex Management LP, the activist hedge fund founded by a former protégé of Carl Icahn, is getting a “tiger cub” of its own.
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Bidders circle Russell Investments arm auctioned by LSE
Arash Massoudi, Joseph Cotterill and Philip Stafford, FT
At least six bidders are circling Russell Investments, the large US asset manager that is being sold by the London Stock Exchange Group, according to people close to the process.
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Do not follow the herd into Chinese stocks
FT.com
According to the Chinese zodiac, 2015 is the year of the sheep. In Chinese equity markets, a herd mentality has broken out. Investors have pushed the asset class towards pre-financial crisis highs and there is little sign of the momentum abating.
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Norway Wealth Fund Has Record Gain as ECB Feeds Stock Surge
Bloomberg Business
The world’s largest sovereign wealth fund gained a record 401 billion kroner ($53 billion) in the first quarter after unprecedented monetary stimulus drove up the value of its equity holdings.
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Banks & Brokers
Mercuria earnings rise after JPMorgan unit swallowed
Neil Hume, Commodities Editor,, FT
Mercuria posted an increase in earnings last year as the fast-growing commodities trader digested the acquisition of JPMorgan’s physical oil and metals business.
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Goldman Sachs’ reported spending on EU lobbying rises 14-fold
Duncan Robinson in Brussels and Tom Braithwaite in New York, FT
Goldman Sachs has revealed a 14-fold increase in the amount it says it spends on lobbying in Brussels after the EU strengthened its disclosure rules.
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Citigroup challenged over ‘opaque’ lobbying at fiery meeting
Ben McLannahan in New York, FT
A ‘Citi’ sign is displayed near Citibank headquarters in Manhattan on December 5, 2012 in New York City. Citigroup Inc. today announced it was laying off 11,000 workers, about 4 percent of its workforce, in a move to slash costs. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)©Getty
Investors challenged Citigroup executives at the bank’s annual shareholder meeting on Tuesday, expressing concerns over “opaque” lobbying efforts, which contributed last year to a watering down of post-crisis regulatory reforms.
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Barclays Earnings: The Takeaways
By GILES TURNER
For Barclays BARC.LN -0.71% PLC, there’s no doubt the past is still proving a burden. The U.K.-based bank announced first quarter earnings on Wednesday, and while underlying profits are up, litigation continues to weigh on the share price and drag profit down.
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Barclays Profit Rises; Sets Aside More for Currency Probe
Bloomberg Business
Barclays Plc set aside an additional 800 million-pound ($1.2 billion) provision toward settling allegations it rigged currency benchmarks as it post first-quarter profit that matched analyst estimates.
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Clearing & Settlement
FIA Global issues recommendations on CCP risks
Automated Trader
Since 2009, when the G20 committed to clear all standardized over-the-counter derivatives, CCPs have grown in their systemic importance in global financial markets and their role as a pillar of global financial reforms. As a result, there has been increased scrutiny of CCP risk from regulators and market participants. FIA Global’s position paper reflects the perspective of clearing members, and addresses the risks that CCPs bring to clearing members, their clients, and the market generally.
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Majority of banks are investing in new payments technology
ACI-Ovum research
The overwhelming majority of banks, retailers and billing organisations worldwide are currently investing or planning to invest within the next two years into new payment technologies and infrastructure, a global survey by payments provider ACI and Ovum has revealed.
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Indexes & Products
Case-Shiller Home Price Index Climbs Modestly in February
WSJ
Home prices continued to rise modestly in February, according to a report released on Tuesday, a continued upward push in home values which underscores concerns that buyers’ incomes aren’t keeping pace.
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Two Index Fund Studies Remind Us of One Good Strategy
Forbes
Index fund investors let the facts speak for themselves. The long-term data comparing active funds to index funds shows actively managed mutual funds underperform in all asset classes and all investment styles. There is no ambiguity in the results, and there’s nothing new to report here. The data has been saying the same thing for decades.
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Apple sweetens S&P 500 buyback and dividend boom
FT.com
Apple is leading a surge in US companies returning cash to shareholders, with S&P 500 equity investors set to receive a record $1tn from buybacks and dividends this year
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Q1 Earnings Scorecard – S&P 500 vs. Russell 2000
Zacks.com
Apple may be able to achieve double-digit earnings and revenue growth. But the iPhone maker is effectively in a league of its own – The magnitude of Apple’s results has a bearing on the aggregate earnings picture, particularly for the Technology sector. But it’s earnings performance and outlook doesn’t tell us much about what to expect from other operators, even in the Technology sector.
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The Yield-Grab Faucet Remains Open, as Long as Rates Are Range Bound
S&P Dow Jones Indices Indexology Blog
Crude oil has been able to recover from its recent free fall and has stabilized at USD 57 over the week. The stability in oil, with the expectation of prices going higher, has investors changing their view from deflation to an increasing inflationary expectation. The performance of the S&P U.S. TIPS Index does not reflect the current inflation conversation.
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Christian Kronseder Joins STOXX Limited As COO
MondoVisione
STOXX Limited, a leading provider of innovative, tradable and global index concepts, today announced that Christian Kronseder will join the company as chief operating officer (COO), as of May 1st, 2015.
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Technology
Quality standard initiative for FinTech industry
Cinnober
Move to increase transparency and confidence in financial markets
A bold new initiative is being launched today that has the potential to benefit the entire financial technology industry – the Financial IT Quality Assessment (FIQA). This is intended as the cornerstone of a public, industry-wide framework for quality assessment of financial software and systems. To kick off the initiative, Cinnober Financial Technology is inviting influential players in the industry to participate in a working group, which is being convened in London on June 8.
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Twitter CEO’s Credibility at Risk After Results Fall Short
Bloomberg Business
Dick Costolo’s credibility is on the line. Twitter Inc.’s chief executive officer failed to foresee a slowdown that forced the social-media company to miss analysts’ first-quarter revenue estimates and cut its 2015 sales forecast, and the stock slumped 18 percent.
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Syndication Inc., Acquires “Day TradeXchange”; Brings the Proprietary Futures Trading Software and Target Indicator “ARCHER”, to the Public
Syndication Inc
DAMASCUS, Md., April 28, 2015 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Syndication Inc., (SYNJ.PK), reports that on April 24th, 2015, the Company’s Board approved the acquisition of “Day TradeXchange” and the proprietary futures trading software and target indicator “ARCHER”.
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Richard Branson holding digital currency summit on private Caribbean island
by Entrepreneur, Fortune Magazine
From May 25 to 28, the Virgin Group founder will co-host a forum about the future of Blockchain and Bitcoin.
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Enforcement
Freelton Ponzi scheme mastermind pleads guilty
By Steve Buist, The Hamilton Spectator
A Freelton man alleged to have been the mastermind of a $15-million Ponzi scheme has pleaded guilty to two criminal charges in a California court. Gordon Driver will be sentenced in September after pleading guilty to one count of wire fraud and one count of making a false statement to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
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SEC investigates customer protection violation by Bank of America-WSJ
Reuters
The Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating whether Bank of America Corp violated customer-protection rules and put retail-brokerage funds at risk to increase profits, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
jlne.ws/1znP58t
SEC Investigating Whether Bank of America Broke Customer-Protection Rules; Bank questioned about potential use of funds that should have been off-limits
By JENNY STRASBURG, WSJ
The Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating whether Bank of America Corp. broke rules designed to safeguard client accounts, potentially putting retail-brokerage funds at risk in order to generate more profits, according to people familiar with the inquiry.
jlne.ws/1GvnO0K
Insider trader gets extra 538 days in UK jail for not paying fine
Reuters
A man convicted of insider trading in Britain must spend another 538 days in jail after failing to pay a court order of more than 450,000 pounds ($680,000) in full, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said on Tuesday.
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SPARTAN COMMODITY FUND MANAGEMENT LLC
NFA
COMPLAINT: On March 9, 2015, NFA issued a Complaint charging Spartan Management with failing to provide periodic account statements to pool participants and failing to deposit pool funds in a bank account in the name of the pool rather than the CPO. The Complaint also charged Spartan Management and Harry with failure to supervise.
DECISION: On April 27, 2015, pursuant to a settlement offer submitted by Spartan and Harry, they were ordered not to apply for NFA membership, associate membership or principal status with any NFA Member for three years.
jlne.ws/1PWEZiP
ASIC bans former Sydney financial adviser for 3 years
ASiC
ASIC has banned Mr Atish Prasad, a former financial adviser of Westmead, Sydney from providing financial services for three years. ASIC found Mr Prasad was not adequately trained or competent to provide a financial service. In addition, ASIC found Mr Prasad failed to comply with the financial services laws.
jlne.ws/1EQdS7c
Environmental & Energy
‘Alternative Protein’ Could Make Up One Third of the Market by 2050
By Leilani Clark – Civil Eats
Could the source of our protein be the most pressing environmental question of the day? Bill Gates seems to think so. The software tycoon has invested in two big plant-based protein start-ups: Hampton Creek and Beyond Meat, and has gone so far as to declare plant-based protein the future of food.
jlne.ws/1FwpL0T
EU to take carbon market decision the size of Cambodia
By Megan Darby – RTCC (Responding to Climate change)
European Union decision makers are closing in on reforms to tackle a glut of pollution permits in the carbon market.
jlne.ws/1EBViOd
Biggest Coal Exporter Says Climate Change Won’t Strand Assets
By Jesse Riseborough – Bloomberg News
Glencore Plc, the top exporter of coal used in power stations, expects efforts to curb climate change by keeping its fossil-fuel reserves in the ground to fail in the face of world energy demand.
jlne.ws/1bCrN3r
Asia-Pacific
The Chinese Are Going for Gold
By CHUIN-WEI YAP
China’s gold consumption showed signs of recovering in the first three months this year after plunging in 2014, as relatively low bullion prices attract Asian interest, especially in gold jewelry.
jlne.ws/1AfvIJr
Poll Results of the 2015 Annual General Meeting
HKEx
At the Annual General Meeting of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (“HKEx”) held on 29 April 2015 (“AGM”), a poll was demanded by the Chairman for voting on all proposed resolutions as set out in the Notice of AGM dated 25 March 2015.
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Diversification made simple through SGX ETFs
SGX
Following MAS’ regulatory amendments of the Excluded Investment Products (EIP) definition for collective investment schemes, the Singapore Exchange (SGX) says that easier access to Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) will provide retail investors with a simple and low-cost way of building a well-diversified investment portfolio.
jlne.ws/1GGTYfl
HKFE Announces Revised Margins for CITIC Limited Futures
HKEx
Hong Kong Futures Exchange Limited (HKFE), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEx), has announced that with effect from the commencement of trading on Tuesday, 5 May 2015, the minimum margins to be collected by an Exchange Participant from its clients in respect of their dealings in the following futures contract will be as outlined in the table below. The adjustments are based on the clearing company’s normal procedures and standard margining methodology.
jlne.ws/1DJAfVV
Frontier Markets
Payments innovation: lessons from emerging markets
Banking Technology
Africa and Asia are the centres of innovation in payments, with the developed markets of the US and Western Europe lagging behind, but the trend is towards domestic offerings rather than regional or international ones.
jlne.ws/1KtnFir
Global X Surprises Investors With A Pakistan ETF – Global X MSCI Pakistan ETF
Seeking Alpha
A wide variety of products have been launched in the ETF world so far this year by several providers. After all, every player is in a mad rush to tap innovative ideas and enjoy a competitive advantage in today’s fast-growing ETF industry.
jlne.ws/1EQokf1
Securities and Exchange Board of India Notices
SEBI
LIC Nomura MF Retirement Benefit Fund
ICICI Prudential Wealth Builder Fund ? Series 1 to 5
Bombay Swadeshi Stores Limited
jlne.ws/12kCz9E
READ MORE: John Lothian Newsletter: The OCC looks to a bright confident day; Navinder Singh Sarao And The Flash Crash: Why Financial Market ‘Spoofing’ Is So Hard To Catch –And Even Harder To Prosecute; Centralised risk raises systemic worries over derivatives.