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The Roaring ‘20s are here! The world of finance looks wonderful – the Dow Jones Industrial Average is at record highs, inflation and interest rates are low, unemployment is at an all-time low, and trade tensions have eased. What could go wrong? Plenty. The Bull Market started in March 2009…

Despite the fact that end-of-year lists always risk being arbitrary, over-simplified, opinionated, and exclusionary, we’ve compiled yet another for “What We Were Talking about in 2019” in Operations and Technology. These areas are in no particular order and include issues and trends because of economic and business changes, regulatory requirements,…

The repo markets in the United States have historically been a relatively obscure but highly important part of the “plumbing” of the capital markets by facilitating overnight and generally, short-term financing of securities transactions primarily in the US Treasury market. Repos are also a key provider of short-term liquidity to…

Investors have a long history of directing their capital towards organizations whose activities lead to desirable social outcomes. The earliest examples of this practice were often associated with specific religious or spiritual frameworks. For example, Shari’a investing principles dating to the first millennium are informed by specific Islamic values that…

In an April 2019 blog post, “Negative Interest Rates? – The Enigma Explored!”, GFMI examined the definition of negative interest rates, the reasons for negative interest rates, and the potential for a better option than buying a fixed income security with a negative yield. In this article we explore the…

In our LIBOR Schmibor article series, I introduced SOFR (See https://www.gfmi.com/articles/libor-schmibor-whats-next-sofr-part/). SOFR issuance continues to expand including the potential use in adjustable rate mortgages. (To view a user’s guide for SOFR, go to https://www.newyorkfed.org/medialibrary/Microsites/arrc/files/2019/Users_Guide_to_SOFR.pdf.) In this article, we intend to explore futures on SOFR, specifically 3-month SOFR futures (SFR) and…

FinTech Defined The recent growth of financial technology, or “fintech,” affects us in many ways. Upon hearing the term “fintech,” you may envision technology related to cryptocurrency, mobile payments, money transfers, crowdfunding, robo-advisors, and asset management. In its broadest definition, fintech is “technologies used and applied in the financial services…

For several years now, and as expected, numerous studies on the annual trends in the wealth management industry have been published, of which all of them – without exception – continuously emphasize the importance of embracing digital wealth management or to expect extinction. Last December, Capgemini, a technology services and…

In Britain, if you say that someone or something is ‘as safe as houses’, you mean that it is completely safe. But is this the case with Central Counterparties, which were designed to provide a level of security in taking on the risk between parties in financial transactions? In September…

It’s 420 In 1971 five high school students in San Rafael, California agreed to meet at a wall across the street from their high school. They called themselves the Waldos, and their objective was to find an abandoned cannabis crop using an old map created by the grower. The time…

There have been several significant regulatory changes to the financial services environment in 2018, and more are anticipated in 2019. Following is a brief summary of some of the most significant of those changes. Stress Testing Randal Quarles, Vice Chair for Supervision at the Fed, announced that changes to ease…

In LIBOR SCHMIBOR: What’s Next? SOFR Part I we covered the following topics: Explanation of LIBOR Potential replacements Repurchase agreements (repos) and Tri-party Repo International benchmarks Looking ahead This article looks to: Define SOFR Discuss applications and new products Update international benchmarks Secured Overnight Financing Rate (SOFR): Definition and Features…