i-P-A News Volume 2. Issue 8:

Some of the latest market news from around the globe

DST International (DSTI). a leader in business solutions for the investment management industry, employs Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) on the latest version of HiPerformance to achieve optimal deployment flexibility and exceptional scalability. The Global Operating Model enables asset managers to deploy a single software solution across all offices, while maintaining speed and flexibility.

HiPerformance’s Global Operating Model is expected to help managers drive down infrastructure costs through the deployment of a single application and database across multiple time-zones and offices. In a recent benchmark, HiPerformance calculated a month’s worth of returns at the security level for seven million portfolios on a single application server in five hours.

Historically, asset management firms have had to manage a trade-off between scalability and functional richness. The new HiPerformance is designed to remove practical scale restrictions, while providing a broad range of performance analytics, including returns, contribution, attribution, look-through analysis, risk and composite management — across all instruments, and all within a single, enterprise solution.

DSTi Global Performance Solution Manager, Des Gallacher, said, The new HiPerformance has been developed in close collaboration with several of our largest and most sophisticated clients, who were seeking greater scalability to manage ever-increasing volumes, and to achieve cost reductions through efficiency gains, while retaining the rich functionality they need to properly analyze their complex investment strategies. In the current business environment where cost containment is paramount, the value proposition for IT projects must be beyond reproach. With that in mind, we have invested over 8,000 man days of R&D to supercharge our solution, and will continue to invest heavily over the next couple of years to consolidate our position at the top end of the market. We are working closely with existing clients during our initial application roll-out, and are also seeing sales interest from prospective clients.

HiPerformance supports GIPS compliance and incorporates performance, attribution, decomposition and composite functionality across all currencies and asset classes. It can be deployed either in-house or as an ASP with web-based tools for inquiries and report distribution .

Finsbury Solutions. a leading supplier of spreadsheet management and compliance software to the financial services sector, announced that leading global alternative asset manager Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co (KKR) has implemented Finsbury Solutions’ advanced Spreadsheet Workbench software system.

Spreadsheet Workbench is based on the latest Microsoft technologies, including SQL Server 2005 and SharePoint 2007, and provides auditability and control over business critical spreadsheets. The system provides finance, risk and audit departments with enhanced transparency and control over the financial reporting process in accordance with the latest financial legislation, such as Sarbanes-Oxley.

Wilshire Analytics. a global leader in providing innovative investment portfolio analytics and a business unit of Wilshire Associates Incorporated, announced the launch of a next generation version of the Wilshire AtlasSM equity analytics system. The Wilshire Atlas Version 11.0 (“Atlas v11”), which provides an integrated collection of tools to manage global equity portfolios for active strategies, includes a number of significant new enhancements to the user interface improving the flexibility and general ease of use of the system both for experienced and first-time users.

“Innovation focused on expanding, improving and updating is a continual process as Wilshire Equity Analytics responds to the needs of its clients around the world,” noted David Hall, senior managing director of Wilshire Associates Incorporated and head of Wilshire Equity Analytics, a division of Wilshire Analytics. “In times such as these, with regulators, boards of directors and money owners reacting to market volatility by focusing on risk-adjusted returns, as well as the sources and contributions to risk, Wilshire Analytics’ clients are increasingly turning to our multi-factor risk and attribution analyses to gain new insight, control risk and provide more comprehensive reporting to their clients,” Hall continued.

“During the course of the last year, the Wilshire Atlas development team has focused its efforts on the development of a new Graphical User Interface (GUI) for the Wilshire Atlas system,” Hall said. “The goal of this project was to advance both the technology that supports the interface, and to improve the functionality of the GUI to facilitate both the organization and management of portfolios within the system. Additionally, the GUI development was designed to make access to the core reports and tools in the system more intuitive, and more straightforward, for both experienced and new users alike.”

All portfolios and indexes loaded in the Wilshire Atlas system now may be viewed and organized within a customizable folder structure. This new Portfolio Navigator was designed to facilitate access to saved portfolios for both the running of new reports and the editing of portfolio holdings. The holdings of each portfolio in the system are now be accessed via the Portfolio Navigator. Upon opening a portfolio, asset positions are displayed in a new portfolio holdings window for every date on which the portfolio has been loaded.

Based on the GUI technology employed in Microsoft® Office 2007, the Wilshire Atlas GUI now gives users access to the analysis tools and utilities of the Wilshire Atlas via a multi-tab toolbar or “ribbon.” Available at all times in the user interface, the Wilshire Atlas ribbon groups each tool in the Wilshire Atlas by function type, thereby displaying in one convenient place all appropriate options for the task at hand. The ribbon also offers users direct access to the tools within the Wilshire Atlas without first having to open a portfolio or create a portfolio list.

Wilshire also has increased the multi-factor risk and attribution functionality of the system to allow users to perform flexible decomposition of risk and return contributions into any user-defined grouping scheme within the system. The risk and factor attribution modules also have been expanded through the addition of a number of new reporting features, including new security detail and linked-period analysis reports. In addition, a new HTML reporting format has been added to the system. Reports built using this format exhibit increased levels of interactivity and, using this format, it is possible to construct group-based attribution reports in the Wilshire Atlas with full drill down capability.

Beyond these developments to the basic system, the reporting capabilities of the Wilshire Atlas have been enhanced with the development of a Microsoft Excel® plug-in associated with the Wilshire Atlas API (both require an additional subscription), which gives users access to the core analysis functions of the system via custom cell functions from within a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. In this way, it is possible to build fully customized reports without needing to code new Microsoft Excel macros.

Alongside the development of a new user interface, Atlas v11 also exhibits enhanced risk and factor attribution reports. Both the Risk Analyzer and model based Factor Attribution tools have been extended to incorporate a number of new reporting options. In particular, the Risk Analyzer application has been developed to include the following enhancements:

• New flexible decomposition of risk reports

• New “multiple portfolio” summary

• User-defined Value at Risk (VaR) Calculation

• Enhanced reporting of security level risk

The multi-factor attribution module in the system has also been expanded and now exhibits a number of new reporting features:

• Flexible decomposition of return

• New linked multi-period reports and multiple portfolio summary reports

• Enhanced security detail return attribution reports

Wilshire Analytics. a worldwide leader in providing innovative portfolio analytics and a business unit of Wilshire Associates Incorporated, a leading global investment services and consulting firm, announced the launch of the Wilshire Axiom APISM for the Wilshire AxiomSM global fixed income analytics solution.

“By offering an application programming interface — API — with the ability to incorporate Wilshire Axiom analytics, characteristics, risk and performance attribution data directly into third-party applications, we continue Wilshire’s commitment to providing our clients with enhanced system capabilities while maintaining industry-standard, high-quality analytics on fixed income securities,” said Peter Matheos, PhD, senior managing director and head of Wilshire Fixed Income Analytics, a division of Wilshire Analytics.

The Wilshire Axiom API allows clients of Wilshire Axiom, the single integrated system for global fixed income analytics, performance attribution, risk management, scenario analysis and portfolio optimization, to “develop and create customized reports using Wilshire Axiom analytics,” Matheos said. “The Wilshire Axiom API was developed for easy integration with familiar products, including Microsoft® Excel®, Microsoft® Windows® operating system, Microsoft® ASP.NET, Microsoft® SQL Server® and related applications. Clients can also immediately utilize the Wilshire Axiom API with Java™. PERL, Python™, Microsoft® Visual Studio C++®,Microsoft® Visual C#® and Microsoft® Visual Basic®.” Matheos added that the Wilshire Axiom API package is delivered with full, complete documentation, including coding examples, and several ready-to-use report templates for Microsoft® Excel®.

Matheos will lead Internet webinars demonstrating the Wilshire Axiom API as part of the ongoing Wilshire Associates Master Class series. “The Wilshire Associates Master Class Internet Webinars are delivered throughout the year by senior executives of Wilshire Fixed Income Analytics on a variety of fixed income topics,” said Mark Lewis, managing director and head of global client relationship management and business development for Wilshire Fixed Income Analytics. Recent topics include ‘Fixed Income Portfolio Stress Testing’ and ‘Multi Factor Fixed Income Performance Attribution.’

Wilshire Analytics is a business unit of Wilshire Associates Incorporated, a leading global investment services and consulting firm which has evolved from a pioneering provider of risk management tools into a highly regarded organization specializing in investment technology solutions, manager-of-managers investment solutions and institutional investment consulting services.

Following a full evaluation of a large range of investment management solutions, Swiss Life, a leading international life insurance and pensions specialist, has selected SimCorp Dimension .

Swiss Life will use SimCorp Dimension as its new platform for asset management, principally supporting order management, portfolio management, compliance, performance measurement and accounting (IFRS) as well as the corresponding reporting.

“In addition to the advantage of a seamless solution, the deciding factors were SimCorp Dimension’s comprehensive functionality as well as the availability of the latest financial instruments,“ says Patrick Frost, group chief investment officer of Swiss Life. “Intensive due diligence has shown that our full requirements can be met.”

“We are delighted to welcome this leading insurance company, Swiss Life, as a new customer. As a high profile firm, it will provide an important reference for our product in the Swiss market,” explains Piero Visani, managing director SimCorp Schweiz AG.

QuIC Financial Technologies Inc. a leading global solutions provider of risk management, pricing and financial analytics solutions, announced the introduction of its innovative structured product and exotics pricing offering called QuIC Mechanics CDL that features an easy-to-use Contract Definition Language (CDL). Designed to help financial institutions accurately determine price and risk for structured products, this new product provides clients with unmatched speed, performance and visibility into pricing models; improving operational efficiency, transparency and time-to-market for its products.companies in this market, ensures a dynamic feedback process whereby NumeriX’s products are continually enhanced with the latest model innovations and user requirements.

“We understand the unique challenges facing the banking and financial services industry. particularly when attempting to address the issue of calculating pricing models,” stated Nigel Cairns, President and CEO of QuIC Financial Technologies, Inc. “With the launch of QuIC Mechanics CDL, we are solidifying our footprint in the structured product marketplace, providing our customers with a best-in-class tool to accurately price structured products and make better informed decisions across their operations.”

A key component of QuIC Mechanics CDL is the Contract Definition Language, a high-level, human readable description of a transaction, which brings added convenience and performance to a broad range of complex instruments and structured products. QuIC Mechanics CDL represents a new, modularized packaging of QuIC’s models and solvers and allows for standard interfaces, resulting in higher memory efficiency and significant performance improvements. It easily captures all the data and information related to a trade, streamlines pricing model processes and defines new trade types in a fraction of the time which facilitates quicker and more accurate pricing of structured products.

With a practical plug and play feature, QuIC Mechanics CDL integrates with many of the finance industry’s leading models and eliminates the need for users to understand each specific programming language before creating a transaction, resulting in increased interoperability and a high level of functionality and performance. With QuIC Mechanics CDL, the Contract Definition Language is separated from the numerical solution, which means the user does not need to be an expert in mathematics to perform the application. QuIC Mechanics CDL easily links to trade capture systems; powers the analytics for third party providers; and improves the consistency across pricing and risk management in all areas of business operations.

“With increased volatility in global markets and ever-changing requirements within the structured products market, banking and financial institutions are demanding a faster, more robust pricing and risk structuring framework,” added Tony Coppellotti, Chief Technology Officer for QuIC. “Our mission is to provide our clients with the most effective and accurate quantitative solutions in the marketplace, so the launch of QuIC Mechanics CDL is a direct response to meet the needs of our clients in this industry.”

This latest product offering from QuIC can also be adapted for modeling instruments for risk management requirements such as calculating credit risk and counterparty exposure. This will provide consistency and accuracy to risk calculations of complex instruments for banking institutions. In line with this announcement, QuIC has introduced new pricing models that are used by QuIC Mechanics CDL, such as its enhanced Multi Currency BGM Model. The Multi Currency BGM Model allows users to price most types of transactions in a single model, resulting in increased consistency and faster time-to-market for its users.

Netik LLC. the industry’s leading financial data management company announced an alliance with Advent Software, Inc., a leading provider of software and solutions for the global investment management industry, to integrate Geneva®, Advent’s award-winning portfolio management and fund accounting solution, and Netik Global Securities Master, Netik GSMTM, a fully managed data service solution and utility for reference and market data. Netik GSM provides a single source of reference and market data for Geneva® and leverages the Advent — Netik connectivity.

Netik and Advent have invested in an adapter, available ‘off-the-shelf’, to combine the two products. The new Geneva® / Netik GSM Adapter solution will be licensed to users through Netik and will be maintained by both companies.

Geneva® / Netik GSM Adapter significantly enhances the delivery of reference and market data for downstream distribution and full integration with consuming applications. The combined solution provides hedge funds, prime brokers and fund administrators with a best-of-breed solution for reference and market data.finance markets, and we look forward to working with the broader group to bring best practice to the European ABS markets.”

Todd Gottula, Senior Vice President and Co-Head of Global Accounts for Advent, said “Geneva® has delivered world class accounting and transaction processing to the market for more than a decade. Now, with a fully managed service solution for reference and market data provided by Netik GSM, new prospects and existing customers have access to a single source of the highest quality reference and market data.”

John Wise, Chief Executive Officer of Netik, stated: “Many of the leading fund administrators and prime brokers already use Advent and Netik. through this alliance with Advent, we are making Netik GSM readily available to the hedge fund market. Getting reference and market data correct is key to any Geneva® implementation and indeed any solution for hedge funds, and with over two decades of proven experience, Netik GSM is ideally positioned to deliver this. Hedge funds can quickly and easily select their universe from the Netik GSM utility, enabling Netik GSM to be implemented within days.

Wise continues: “Our combined offering provides customers with a truly end-to-end solution for reference and market data.”

SmartCo Software. a global software provider of Enterprise Data Management solutions for the financial industry, announced its partnership with Thomson Reuters. the world’s leading source of intelligent information for businesses and professionals, and the availability of its new Thomson Reuters Datascope connector.

Leading new generation Enterprise Data Management solution, Smart Financial Data Hub, provides a centralised EDM solution allowing acquisition, centralization, validation and distribution of all enterprise data including securities, third-parties, index, benchmarks, funds, mandates, positions and transactions. Its cutting-edge technology accelerates design and deployment of durable and upgradeable solutions. Thanks to an open, easy and highly flexible data model, SFDH allows customers to reduce their risks, optimize their processes, meet regulatory expectations and decrease the time to market for the delivery of new products.

The new connector emulates most of core business functionalities of Datascope Select and, from the SFDH interface, users can now easily create and manage data requests on any kind of asset classes. The data template structure is dynamically defined and triggers data information requests to Datascope Select in real time.

A breakfast briefing organized in Paris on June the 26th allowed SmartCo and Thomson Reuters to demonstrate to a large audience of financial institution representatives the benefit of this new connector.

“By leveraging their Thomson Reuters data feed, our client will be able to enhance their data acquisition process and improve manipulation and administration of large and complex data volumes” said Thierry Zemb, SmartCo Head of Product Management.

Thanks to these two complementary solutions, Thomson Reuters for the information data and SFDH for their centralized management, our clients will create a solid and reliable data container that could feed all internal information systems in a flexible, user friendly and integrated way”. This event was also the opportunity for SmartCo to demonstrate latest enhancements around integration of Thomson Reuters Commodity Data feed. Listed and OTC contracts with all their characteristics are now available in the application for a large number of underlyings including oil, electricity, carbon emission, gold, metals, fertilizer, rice wheat, etc.

“There is a great need from financial organizations for modern and powerful tools allowing automating acquisition and extending the usage of data while keeping high level of control and validation process. Constant improvement of our platform lets our clients keeping pace with market evolutions and innovations and building a scalable and industrialized information system” said Mr. Zemb.

Markit. a leading provider of independent data, portfolio valuations and over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives trade processing to the global financial markets, announced that it was voted Data Vendor of the Year at the 2008 Global Investor Awards.

The accolade recognises data vendors that have made a significant contribution to the buy-side community thanks to the quality of their financial information services. The panel of judges was comprised of Global Investor’s editorial team who consulted independent third parties.

Global Investor noted that Markit has established itself as a leading player in the OTC markets, setting industry standards in independent pricing, portfolio valuations and trade processing across asset classes. The panel highlighted the role played by the Markit indices in the credit markets as well as the work the company has undertaken to increase the efficiency of the matching, confirmation and settlement processes within the trade life cycle.

Caroline Allen, Editor of Global Investor, said: “The work Markit is doing to promote understanding, transparency and efficiency on the buy-side was considered extremely valuable. The importance of reliable, up-to-date data and data systems has never been greater.”

Mike Rushmore, Executive Vice President, Sales and Marketing at Markit, said: “We are delighted that our contribution to the industry has been acknowledged by Global Investor with this award. With a number of services specifically designed for the buy-side, Markit now has more than 1,000 buy-side institutions using our services to manage risk, enhance trading activities and improve operational efficiency.”

Global Investor is a monthly magazine dedicated to the international investment community.

Data Explorers Limited. the securities finance specialists, announced that it has been appointed by Clearstream Banking to provide performance measurement and benchmarking for their securities lending programme. The company will also use Data Explorers’ Transaction Explorer service to assist with trading decisions, in London and Luxembourg.

Jean Robert Wilkin, Executive Director and Head of GSF Product Management at Clearstream said: “We are confident that Performance Explorer will enhance the service we offer to our lenders. Performance Explorer and Transaction Explorer will enable us to ensure our clients are achieving the best returns and maximizing the lending value and potential of their portfolios”.

Julian Pittam, global sales director at Data Explorers added: “We are delighted to welcome Clearstream Banking to our service, a key tri-party lender who will extend our reach across Europe.”Debra A. Baker, managing director, Global Product Management — Performance & Risk Analytics at BNY Mellon Asset Servicing, adds: “Now, more than ever, our clients are looking to us to provide advanced attribution methodologies, intuitive risk management tools, and extended reporting capabilities. Our alliance with Wilshire will assist in empowering us to continue to meet the client demand for advanced risk management services across the regions and across multiple market segments.”

FINCAD and SimCorp have entered into an agreement to integrate FINCAD’s derivatives pricing software into SimCorp’s investment management enterprise solution, SimCorp Dimension.

The global agreement extends SimCorp Dimension’s integrated pricing mechanism to encompass a wider range of derivatives than ever before. These include credit derivatives and instruments implemented within the system’s new XpressInstruments framework, such as exotic derivatives, structured products and hybrids. These can now be valued directly from within SimCorp Dimension using FINCAD’s advanced theoretical pricing solutions.

As a result SimCorp Dimension customers can eliminate data manipulation tasks required to price such positions and thus reduce operational risk while simultaneously improving efficiency.

Sшren G.A. Pedersen, vice president for partner development at SimCorp comments, FINCAD derivatives pricing expertise perfectly complements SimCorp Dimension, allowing us to offer our customers access to timely, accurate and proven pricing for credit and other more complex derivatives seamlessly from their existing SimCorp Dimension solutions.

Bill Stewart, Vice-President of Sales at FINCAD comments, As derivatives are increasingly traded on an individual basis, a precise valuation of each contract is crucial in providing an accurate portfolio valuation. With SimCorp joining the FINCAD Alliance Program, we are delighted to assist SimCorp customers to achieve this and to stay ahead in ‘s international financial markets.

FinAnalytica Inc.. provider of post-modern risk management and portfolio construction analytics, and RIMES Technologies Corporation. leading financial data aggregator, announced a partnership that will allow SmartFiles, RIMES’ full-service customized data delivery solution to feed FinAnalytica’s CognityFoF analytics platform.

SmartFiles take the pain out of data processing, providing immediate access to over 200 premium financial sources and incorporating in-house information as easily as third-party datasets. All data sources become accessible via a single, direct data feed via the Cognity software suite.

Christian Fauvelais, CEO of RIMES Technologies, commented: “RIMES pioneered the delivery of financial data over the Internet. We introduced SmartFiles in response to clients’ demands for something which would simplify in-house data management, leaving them to focus on their core business. Through customized file delivery, FinAnalytica will receive quality data which exactly meets the specific needs of their clients, formatted the way they want.”

FinAnalytica will use the SmartFiles service to aggregate and initially deliver over 600 branded risk factor indices from leading sources including Standard & Poor’s, Russell, MSCI, Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, CBOE and Hedge Fund Research.

“We are very excited about our new partnership with RIMES,” said Doug Martin, CEO of FinAnalytica. “Integrating RIMES SmartFiles service into our CognityFoF platform allows us to be responsive to customer demand for high quality, timely risk factor data. Using RIMES’ best-of-breed data aggregation and delivery allows us to focus on FinAnalytica’s best-of-breed risk and portfolio construction analytics.”

FINCAD announces the launch of FINCAD Market Data, addressing an important need in the industry for valuation and risk analytics combined with market data. FINCAD has provided industry-standard analytics to financial professionals since 1990, and now offers a fully-integrated solution with financial analytics and market data to support virtually all FINCAD XL functions.

FINCAD Market Data is already integrated with the latest version of FINCAD XL. This means users won’t need to maintain or integrate separate market data processing systems and software. Licensed users can access FINCAD Market Data from anywhere using the Internet.

FINCAD Market Data collects, verifies, and stores market data from the world’s major exchanges and OTC markets every day. Current and historical data is available to support valuations back to December 1999.

“Industry challenges are increasing due to the need for pricing transparency,” said Jack McKeown, Director of Product Management at FINCAD. “And it’s happening quickly. ’s financial markets demand independent, trusted valuations and risk measures. These are busy professionals so the ability to get reliable, accurate end-of-day market data with a click of a button is critical.”

NumeriX LLC. the leading provider of independent cross-asset analytics for derivatives and structured products, has opened the doors to its new global headquarters in Midtown, Manhattan at 150 E. 42nd Street, New York. A significant portion of NumeriX’s 140 employees will occupy nearly 25,000 square feet of space in the facility, which was most recently occupied by Loews. NumeriX maintains 10 offices throughout the Americas, EMEA and Asia/Pac.

Given the issues in ’s financial markets, financial institutions, banks, insurance companies and corporate treasurers alike are looking for solutions to manage, value and hedge existing derivative investments to make prudent investment and risk management decisions. This heightened demand has led NumeriX to increase its professional staff to meet the requirements of its rapidly growing client base.

“Through this challenging time, we have been able to welcome many talented and experienced professionals to our family, as we’ve needed to strategically grow our professional staff to accommodate the demands of a market in transition,” said NumeriX President and COO, Steven R. O’Hanlon. ”In selecting our new headquarters, we were very discriminative to ensure that the space promotes collaboration between our business leaders and is reflective of the world-class organization that we have become.”

NumeriX’s new headquarters features natural light throughout the workspace, open areas for increased collaboration, and additional room for future talent — as the organization continues to grow.

MSCI Barra. a leading provider of investment decision support tools worldwide, including indices and portfolio risk and performance analytics, is pleased to announce that the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS), the second largest public pension plan in the US with USD 162.2 billion in assets under management, has chosen to use BarraOne for enterprise-wide portfolio risk management.

BarraOne will be used by CalSTRS to help it monitor portfolio risk and make asset allocation decisions, as well as in the portfolio risk management of CalSTRS internal equity program. The external equity group at CalSTRS already employs Barra Analytics on FactSet to help in the selection and monitoring of their external equity managers.

Baer Pettit, Managing Director and Global Head of Client Coverage at MSCI Barra, said, We are delighted that CalSTRS has chosen BarraOne to help them manage and monitor portfolio risk throughout their organization. The fact that BarraOne is being used by different groups within CalSTRS to help them with the various steps of the investment process reinforces BarraOne’s robust functionality and flexible structure.”

CalSTRS is one of several major public pension plans in the US to adopt BarraOne to better gauge and manage the risk across asset classes in their plan. CalSTRS provides retirement related benefits and services to teachers in public schools and community colleges throughout California.

NumeriX. the independent leading analytics provider for the structuring, pricing and valuation of derivatives and structured products announced a partnership with Pyxis Systems, a provider of technology solutions and services to the global financial derivatives industry. This groundbreaking partnership will expand integration and support services for NumeriX customers throughout AsiaPac, from Hong Kong and India.

Since establishing its Asian operations in 1998 with offices in Tokyo and Singapore, and most recently in Hong Kong, NumeriX has developed a reputation for delivering the most sophisticated analytic solutions for structuring and pricing derivative and structured product instruments, making it the solution of choice for some of the largest institutions in the region. Moreover, NumeriX’s relationships with over 40 partners provide institutions the ability to build end-to-end solutions — from pre-trade structuring, through pricing, trade capture and valuation.