• New guide to ‘Ethics in Banking and Finance’ provides firms and senior leaders with a reference resource relating to workplace culture, conduct and ethics.

• Online resource helps navigate the interaction between various aspects of company law, corporate governance, financial regulation and market-based guidance and acts as a useful reference point for boards, non-executive directors (NEDs), and senior managers.

Norwegian software vendor Commercial Banking Applications (CBA), today announced that the latest release of its IBAS GTF – Global Trade Finance Factory – went live at all CBA’s user banks in November 2018, in full compliance with SWIFT Release 2018.  Release 10.23 of IBAS GTF incorporates all changes mandated by SWIFT to its Messages for the handling of Documentary Credits.  The new IBAS Release enables a high-level of automation, digitisation and robotisation of the processes from end-to end, across the trade finance ecosystem.

OpenFin, the operating system (OS) of finance, today announced the launch of OpenFin Cloud Services, providing every bank, asset manager, hedge fund and wealth management firm with its own FDC3-standard private app store and workspace management solution out of the box, eliminating the need for time-consuming and costly internal builds.

‘Innovation’ in insurance is no longer a luxury, it is a necessity. But to remain competitive, operationally efficient and to provide modern customers and clients with what they want, innovation demands time and dedicated resources. 

Research published today by Investec shows that too few tech businesses are taking advantage of developing effective ecosystems of sales partners (their channel programmes) to achieve scale-up growth rates. While IT companies have forecasted an average annual growth of eight per cent over the next three years, too many are missing their potential to achieve scale-up growth of 20 per cent or more with poor channel performance a major contributing factor.

Cloud Elements today announced $25 million in new funding to accelerate market adoption of its breakthrough API integration platform for software providers. The Series C round was led by Mercato Partners, with additional funding from existing investors Access Ventures, American Express Ventures, Grotech Ventures, Harbert Growth Partners, Rally Ventures, and Upslope Ventures. The new round brings Cloud Elements’ total capital raised to $46.2 million. 

SWIFT today announces a major milestone in the take-up of gpi with more than $40trn transferred over the service in 2018. Rapid adoption saw the share of cross-border messages using gpi soar from 15% at the start of 2018, to 56% by the end of the year, a year-on-year increase of 270%. More than 3,500 banks, accounting for 85% of SWIFT’s total payments traffic, have committed to adopting gpi, evidencing how the service has achieved the near total transformation of the cross-border payments landscape just two years since launch.

Solactive is pleased to announce that Canadian ETF provider Horizons ETFs Management (Canada) Inc. (“Horizons ETFs”) utilizes the Solactive Laddered Canadian Preferred Share Index as the underlying index for the Horizons Laddered Canadian Preferred Share Index ETF (“HLPR”), which lists on the Toronto Stock Exchange today. The index includes more than 170 Canadian preferred share securities that generally have an adjustable dividend rate.

Velocity Ledger Financial, a technology solution supporting the institutional investment and trading processes for digital assets and security tokens, has selected Prime Trust as its preferred custodian. Through this partnership, Velocity Ledger Financial and Prime Trust will facilitate the issuance and custody of digital assets, supporting the growth of tokenized assets in the new digital economy.