RBL Bank selects Adenza to deliver a future-ready treasury platform

Adenza, the company formed by the merger of Calypso Technology and AxiomSL to provide customers with end-to-end, trading, treasury, risk management, and regulatory compliance platforms, has announced that RBL Bank, one of India’s leading private sector banks, who had implemented the Calypso Treasury solution for its foreign exchange (FX), fixed income, money market, equity, mutual funds, and repo operations, continues to leverage the platform for expanding its business further.

The first implementation for the bank was the Calypso front-to-back treasury solution for derivatives. Since then, the bank has gone live with additional modules of the Calypso platform for cash and fixed income products. These solutions helped the bank enhance its functions and give it a competitive edge with increased productivity achieved through real-time position monitoring, automated settlement, reduced operational risk and faster turnaround time due to straight-through processing (STP) and automated workflows.

"Building on the strong partnership and support that RBL Bank has given us for the last few years, we are confident that our single, integrated technology platform will provide a foundation for more next generation banks in the region to grow and scale their businesses," commented RG Manalac, APAC managing director at Adenza. "We are happy to support RBL Bank in their ongoing business transformation, backed by a proficient local team at our India Center of Excellence and with our investment in continued R&D enhancements."

 

Standard Chartered initiates research coverage of crypto assets

Responding to rapidly growing institutional interest in publicly traded digital assets, Standard Chartered’s Global Research team has initiated coverage of crypto assets with in-depth reports on Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH).

The crypto research team is led by Geoff Kendrick, who also heads emerging markets FX (West), and includes quantitative strategist Melissa Chan and Europe economist Christopher Graham.  The team will provide insights to clients looking to invest in or trade crypto assets, keeping them up to date with the latest developments and pricing outlook.

"The gap between traditional finance and the digital world is narrowing by the day," said Eric Robertsen, global head of Research and chief strategist for Standard Chartered. "As our clients begin exploring cryptocurrencies, other digital assets, and decentralised finance, we aim to add value to their investment and risk-management strategies and help them navigate and incorporate this new asset class into their businesses."

 

HDFC Bank taps Bloomberg to support the transition to risk-free rates

HDFC Bank, India’s largest private sector bank, has adopted Bloomberg’s Multi-Asset Risk System (MARS) in its technology stack, as it prepares for the transition to risk-free rates (RFR).

With the December 2021 deadline of LIBOR cessation approaching for banks, HDFC Bank will adopt and integrate Bloomberg MARS Front Office and MARS Valuations solutions with their core banking system, to efficiently implement and transition into the new RFR regime. HDFC will tap on Bloomberg solutions to calculate interest using the new '1 Day effective rate' and pass on entries into their Core Banking System.

"Moving to a new reference rate system is extremely complex and resource-intensive, and requires us to take into account local jurisdictions, overnight rates, a combination of holiday calendars and new conventions of lookback and observation shifts," noted Ashish Parthasarthy, treasurer of HDFC Bank. "Bloomberg’s Multi-Asset Risk System enables us to overcome operational challenges with easy-to-use tools that are adapted to the new alternative rates."

"The end of LIBOR brings many operational challenges for firms with the need to supplement or even replace risk management systems to support new rates and conventions," added Bing Li, head of APAC at Bloomberg. "We are pleased to support HDFC in structuring and managing post-LIBOR risk, with consistent calculations across their entire portfolio with various asset classes."

 

FundingXchange and iwoca partner on fully automated merchant cash advance

Iwoca, a European small business lender, has launched a cash advance product on FundingXchange for small business online sellers. The lender is using open banking to offer fully automated revenue-based repayments to e-commerce businesses with a business bank account on the marketplace.

Businesses operating on platforms such as eBay can access flexible revenue-based repayment loans of between £1,000-£50,000 when trying to source a loan product on FundingXchange’s online marketplace. The lender says that the maximum loan of £50,000 is the starting amount and is expected to increase as the product is scaled.

With one fixed fee and no interest on the loan, business owners repay what they have borrowed based on revenues. Using open banking technology, iwoca will calculate the monthly repayments based on the business’ revenues and take a pre-agreed portion of that revenue to repay the loan. The Cash Advance product will enable SMEs to choose a loan repayment profile that mirrors their trading ups and downs - allowing for maximum flexibility during interruptions in operation or seasonal dips.