Regulatory changes and pressures have never been higher. At the same time, more complex asset types are hitting the markets. As a result, firms need efficient compliance monitoring and investment transparency tools. ION’s mission is to help firms overcome these challenges.
What sets ION apart from other suppliers is its holistic range of solutions. ION’s trading solutions connect clients with financial markets and exchanges around the world. Its treasury solutions help with bank account management, and its commodities management technology supports supply chains.
ION global head of equities product management Robert Cioffi said, “This product portfolio enables ION to play a crucial role in the functioning of capital markets, trading and risk management solutions, targeted data and market intelligence, and banking solutions. It also enables ION to have a positive impact on the global economy.”
Two of ION’s standout products are Fidessa Surveillance and XTP Risk JANUS.
Fidessa Surveillance
Fidessa Surveillance is a multi-compliance solution covering three main functional areas that share a common dataset: market abuse detection, regulatory reporting, and business analytics. It was originally built to comply with the first “Market Abuse Regulation” in 2005. It was then extended to cover other asset classes: fixed income, exchange-traded and OTC derivatives, and more recently, FX.
The solution is a flexible buy- and sell-side regulatory data management and monitoring system with near real-time reporting. Its features include integrating data and events from multiple internal and external sources to deliver consolidated recordkeeping, monitoring, and reporting.
Cioffi said, “Fidessa Surveillance blends an algorithmic approach to market abuse pattern recognition with AI and ML techniques that enhance the effectiveness of controls and reduce the operational effort of compliance teams.”
He added that it has a unique approach to compliance that prioritises data quality enforcement during collection, stressing validation, accurate synchronisation, and correlation across multiple sources.
Cioffi said, “Fidessa Surveillance is a solution that competes in the regulatory reporting and market abuse detection markets. Both are mature markets, but Fidessa Surveillance’s USPs relate to the advanced use of technology, functional coverage, and being a one-stop-shop solution for complying with multiple regulations in different jurisdictions.”
XTP Risk JANUS
XTP Risk JANUS is a real-time position-keeping system for defining risk analytics and limits, generating alerts when limits are breached. It supports pre-trade, at-trade and post-trade risk models across asset classes and markets.
The platform aggregates data from multiple sources, including back and middle offices, clearing platforms, execution platforms, and market data sources. This is then positioned in flexible portfolio hierarchies that adapt to different operating models supporting credit and counterparty risk, market risk, and compliance with electronic trading monitoring regulations.
Speaking on its development, Mirko Marcadella – XTP Risk JANUS product owner – said, “XTP Risk JANUS is a trading platform agnostic, real-time risk management system. It was developed when risk was managed at the end of the day with VAR and Stress Testing tools, or pre-trade in a simplistic and limited way within trading platforms. There was clearly a gap in the market to aggregate and look at intraday risk in real time.”
He added that a significant part of market activity and potential risk relates to the trading performed by FIs that don’t carry positions overnight, yet daily generate millions of orders and trades with algorithms. This needs to be monitored and controlled, particularly in a volatile market, which is what JANUS was built to do.
Another solution under ION’s XTP brand is XTP Central Limits. This solution was created to provide brokers with a centralised way to manage their pre-trade limit approval process, and reconcile a central repository with the limits implemented in each trading platform.
Marcadella added, “XTP Central Limits is designed to minimise the time to market and maintenance effort. The result is that adding a new trading platform to the system only requires configuration. It does not need lengthy programming or deployment processes.”
They concluded, “At ION, we help financial institutions and corporates unify their operations from front to back and simplify them across asset classes. Our solutions automate the complete trade lifecycle, help to reduce operational risk, and deliver actionable insights whenever and wherever companies need them. We have decades of shared experience and successful client partnerships. We’re constantly setting new standards for performance, resilience, and innovation.”
ION was one of the companies to feature in the new RegTech100 list. Find the full list here.
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