Eventus Systems, Inc., a leading global provider of multi-asset class trade surveillance and market risk solutions, has won the award for Best in RegTech at Markets Media’s 2021 Markets Choice Awards. This is the firm’s second consecutive win in the category and the second major award win this month for Eventus.

The ninth annual Markets Choice Awards recognize the best in capital markets trading and technology across the market ecosystem. Following public online polling about the shortlist in each category, Markets Media determines winners from online responses, editorial interviews with leaders in financial markets and consultation with its MCA Advisory Board.

Eventus CEO Travis Schwab said: “We’re grateful to Markets Media and the financial market community for this fantastic recognition once again. Following up on the firm’s most successful year to date, we have worked tirelessly this year to continue our global growth initiatives, our constant enhancement of the Validus platform and our ongoing collaboration with clients to meet their evolving compliance and risk challenges. We’ve also further established our position as a global leader in providing trade surveillance and anti-money laundering / transaction monitoring capabilities to cryptocurrency exchanges around the world, in addition to our broad reach into more traditional asset classes. I’m incredibly proud of our team for all of the achievements and accolades over the last year, as we continue winning mandates to replace legacy surveillance and risk platforms.”

Terry Flanagan, Markets Media Editor, said: “Eventus continues to stand out among RegTech providers, with a very flexible, customizable trade surveillance platform that the firm is continuously updating to meet the needs of market participants, exchanges and regulators. Its new automation and analytics tools are among hundreds of features and enhancements over the past year that distinguish the platform, which meets the rigorous security requirements of many of the largest crypto exchanges.”

Eventus earlier this month won the award for Best Sell-Side Market Surveillance Provider in WatersTechnology’s 2021 Sell-Side Technology Awards, following numerous awards last year, including the FOW International Award for Market Surveillance Solution of the Year (second consecutive year); the Markets Media Market Choice Award for Best in RegTech and the RegTech Insight Award for Best Trade Surveillance Solution for the Dodd-Frank Act (second consecutive year). The firm was also named to the global RegTech100 list for the third year running and in late 2020 secured a spot on the Chartis Energy50 2021 list, ranking the world’s major technology players in modern energy markets. In addition, Business Insider featured Eventus as one of its “Breakout B2B Fintech Stars,” and Harrington Starr’s Financial Technologist magazine last month named the firm one of the Most Influential Financial Technology Companies.

Markets Media was launched in 2007 with one mission: to be the pre-eminent provider of news and information about trading and technology in capital markets. The coverage remit spans equities, fixed income and foreign exchange (FX), and covers buy-side investment managers, sell-side broker-dealers, exchanges, trading platforms, technology providers and regulators. Markets Media Group publishes Markets Media and Traders Magazine in the U.S., Best Execution and The DESK in Europe, and GlobalTrading in Asia.

 About Eventus Systems

Eventus Systems is a leading global provider of multi-asset class trade surveillance and market risk solutions. Its powerful, award-winning Validus platform is easy to deploy, customize and operate across equities, options, futures, foreign exchange (FX), fixed income and digital asset markets. Validus is proven in the most complex, high-volume and real-time environments of tier-1 banks, broker-dealers, futures commission merchants (FCMs), proprietary trading groups, market centers, buy-side institutions, energy and commodity trading firms, and regulators. The company’s rapidly growing client base relies on Validus and Eventus’ responsive support and product development teams to overcome its most pressing regulatory challenges. For more, visit www.eventussystems.com. 

Matrix, the award-winning solution provider to asset owners and managers has been selected by QSuper, one of Australia’s largest superannuation funds. Matrix will provide a fully integrated data management solution across security, pricing, positions, accounts, risk, performance, and corporate actions data. QSuper manages AUD ~$106b in retirement savings for more than 600,000 Australians. 

QSuper embarked on a significant data strategy project to create a vendor and custodian agnostic data model, which supports the scalability of its capabilities and, were tasked with procuring a new off-the-shelf data warehouse solution. 

The new system will handle numerous types of market data including security data, pricing, and corporate action data. It will also consolidate information from a variety of accounting, risk and order management systems along with the acquisition and normalization of data from third party providers. The solution will validate, scrub and enrich all data to create a golden copy which can be used for key data domains such as securities and pricing. The Matrix warehouse will also store historical data for all the relevant domains and as an end-to-end solution it will also distribute data to downstream systems. 

Rein van Rooyen, the Head of Investment Performance & Operations at QSuper, commented. “This is an important and highly strategic project for our business as we harness our data as an asset for our members.  We do not only manage $100bn of assets for our members, but also have access to $100bn worth of data which we can draw on to help improve our investment decision making process.  We needed to establish a strategic partnership with a firm that understood the challenges that asset owners encounter in managing core data. It was advantageous that Matrix leverages modern technology and benefits through utilising cloud services. Having evaluated a number of system providers, the Matrix IDM solution was the closest fit for our needs.  Choosing the right technology was key, however we were also looking for a company that had proven experience in solving the data challenges faced by asset owners, which was the deciding factor. We are looking forward to working closely with them on this programme and to achieving a successful outcome.”

Neil Lotter, Co-Founder & CEO, Matrix concluded. “QSuper is a flagship organization in the investment community and for them to put their trust in us and our technology is an incredible compliment. We thank them for this monumental opportunity and we can’t wait to get started.”

SEI today announced that Nigel Aston has been appointed as Sales Director of Defined Contribution (DC) for SEI’s UK Institutional Group. Based in London, Aston will oversee SEI’s DC business development for the EMEA region, continuing to grow SEI’s Master Trust, the company’s DC governance solution.

Aston has a long and successful track record of driving DC strategies. Prior to joining SEI, Aston most recently served as a Senior Managing Director at State Street Global Advisors, where he was responsible for global workplace strategy and ESG. He also previously held roles at Standard Life, AXA and technology startup DCisions, spanning areas including investment design, sales, marketing and communication.  

Commenting on his appointment, Aston said:

“After working with numerous pension and investment firms, both large and small, I’m convinced that few are getting it completely right, and many are actually getting it quite wrong. SEI is big enough to matter, small enough to care and nimble enough to make rapid improvements in how we deliver the great retirements that everyone deserves. I’m really excited to be joining a company that is building pensions innovations that are not just different—they’re fundamentally better.”

Steve Charlton, Managing Director of DC, EMEA and Asia, for SEI’s UK Institutional Group, added:

“Nigel’s experience and expertise will be invaluable as we continue to expand our Master Trust offering. Communicating the Master Trust’s benefits to prospective employers and members is critical to how much we can improve members’ retirement outcomes. We look forward to Nigel’s focus in this area and are delighted to welcome him to the team.”

About the SEI Master Trust

The SEI Master Trust provides a fully-bundled solution for employers delivering defined contribution (DC) schemes. An independently-assured DC provision, the Master Trust encompasses investment management, member communications and administration, as well as utilises a manager-of-managers platform established over 25 years ago and overseen by more than 115 in-house investment experts. With its global scale and 13-year heritage as one of the first U.K. Master Trust providers, the SEI Master Trust offers customised solutions and a complete member journey, guiding members through retirement and beyond.

About SEI’s Institutional Group

SEI’s Institutional Group provides institutional investors with outsourced investment management services and custom platforms to support insourced investment staffs. SEI is one of the first and largest global providers of outsourced or OCIO investment management services to the institutional marketplace and recently launched its Enhanced CIO services globally to institutional investors that desire to have internal resources. The company delivers these integrated solutions to more than 450 clients in 9 countries, as of March 31, 2021. Our solutions are designed to help clients meet financial objectives, reduce business risk and fulfill their due diligence requirements through implemented strategies for the management of defined benefit plans, defined contribution plans, endowments, foundations and board-designated funds. For more information visit: seic.com/institutional-investors

About SEI

After 50 years in business, SEI (NASDAQ:SEIC) remains a leading global provider of investment processing, investment management, and investment operations solutions designed to help corporations, financial institutions, financial advisors, and ultra-high-net-worth families create and manage wealth. As of March 31, 2021, through its subsidiaries and partnerships in which the company has a significant interest, SEI manages, advises or administers approximately $1 trillion in hedge, private equity, mutual fund and pooled or separately managed assets, including approximately $384 billion in assets under management and $836 billion in client assets under administration. For more information, visit seic.com.

Comment from Phil Bailey, Director at Twenty7Tec about the 95% market in terms of ESIS and searches:

“It’s fair to say that the Government’s 95% guarantee scheme has reignited mortgage searches in that loan to value range.

“Since March 3^rd, we have seen mortgage searches for products in the 95-100% range up eight-fold. The week after his announcement, 95% mortgages formed 1.02% of mortgage searches. 6 weeks later, after the first full week operating under the scheme, that’s now 8.00%. Total mortgage searches over those weeks were stable.

“In terms of first time buyers, volumes of mortgage searches have remained stable for products up to 95% since the Budget. But product searches in the 95% range have gone up 12-fold.

“In terms of having lenders sign up, it’s working. In terms of having demand find an outlet? It’s working.

“Over the same period, we have seen the total number of ESIS documents created in the 90-100% range rise by 50%. There’s clearly still unmet demand in the market, but we think that over coming days, we’ll see more matches made between products both in and out of the scheme in the 95% range and the obvious demand that has built up in this area over the past year.”

Finastra today announced that Mizrahi-Tehafot Bank, the third largest bank in Israel, has chosen its pre-packaged payments solution, Fusion Payments To Go. The solution, aimed at small and medium-sized banks looking to implement domestic and cross-border payment services, will enable the bank to offer its customers frictionless and immediate payments, with reduced, fixed implementation cost. With a modern and agile solution in place, the bank will be able to better serve its customers, and in turn to grow its business, whilst being prepared for changing regulations such as ISO 20022.

Dudi Avni, Head of Delivery Channels Applications at Mizrahi-Tehafot Bank said, “The payments landscape is accelerating at a quicker pace than ever before and payments is now a strategic pillar for our business. Using Finastra’s payment hub will enhance our customer service and enable Mizrahi-Tehafot Bank to fulfil its strategic plan regarding payment services. Until now, we have been using in-house solutions for processing payments. Both retail and corporate clients are increasingly demanding a more seamless payment experience and a broader set of payment options."

“We quickly realized that we needed a market-leading off-the-shelf payment solution capable of unifying our current infrastructure. Finastra’s pre-packaged solution, based on its tried and tested global payment hub, will go far in helping us do so, whilst bringing sizable cost savings. With a large team of hundreds of people dedicated to the development of Finastra’s payments products, we know we are in safe hands and ready for tomorrow’s payment challenges.”

Built on Finastra’s payment hub, Fusion Global PAYplus, Fusion Payments To Go provides best-practice functionality and operating rules for supported clearing and settlement mechanisms, along with standard integration to external applications. It removes the need for expensive scheme maintenance, meaning that banks can redirect these funds towards the delivery of innovative business services that will improve the customer experience and deliver revenue growth.

Finastra looks after all elements from contracting, onboarding, service operations and upgrades, to billing – reducing the bank’s operational costs and providing a faster time to market. Fusion Payments To Go is available to mid- and small-tier banks in Europe interested in implementing RT1 and/or TIPS immediate payments, as well as the FED and TCH immediate payment schemes in the US, with other schemes to follow. It also supports banks worldwide looking to implement SWIFT. In this case, the solution will cover three types of clearing: SWIFT, Zahav (Israeli Real-Time Gross Settlement) and global liquidity management.

Avi Benzvi, Country Manager in Israel at Finastra said, “With Fusion Payments To Go, we’re enabling regional banks like Mizrahi-Tehafot to be more competitive, grow their business and market share, with faster time to value for them and their customers. Mizrahi-Tehafot is ahead of the curve when it comes to innovation in financial services in Israel. It has long been an early adopter of new technologies, and we’ve no doubt that our solution will help them drive further growth. We’re excited to be part of their ongoing success.”

Mizrahi-Tehafot has been a Finastra customer for over 20 years and also runs Finastra lending and capital markets solutions.

FSS (Financial Software and Systems), a globally leading provider of integrated payment products and India’s largest payment processor, announced new enhancements to FSS Merchant Hub to maximize the value of the acquirer ecosystem for merchants through support for new transactional journeys and superior merchant service. 

FSS Merchant Hub is a unique merchant support system designed for today’s omnichannel payments landscape. An integrated platform that consolidates critical business functions -- merchant onboarding, pricing, commissions and fee management, accounting, clearing and settlement across POS, internet, and mobile channels, FSS Merchant streamlines operations and boosts business efficiencies. 

The enhancements introduced by FSS Merchant Hub enable acquirers to:

• Maximize transactions flowing on their network via multiple interchange support.
• Enhance settlement processes to support new payments flows – contactless (tap and pay) transactions. 
• Simplify definition and computing of merchant incentives, improving the overall management of incentive programs. 

Commenting on the enhancements, N. Sathish, Dy CPO, FSS Retail Payments, stated: “An agile operational backbone - adaptable to market and regulatory forces - is vital for ensuring the visible front-end aspects of the acquiring business run smoothly. The current enhancements introduced in FSS Merchant Hub will help acquirers keep pace with evolving transactional needs, boost merchant service levels and propel growth.”

The rapid adoption of new payment methods necessitates that acquirers support multiple interchange schemes. The coverage for additional payment schemes - Diners Club International, China Union Pay, JCB, Amex as well as Bahrain BENEFIT allows acquirers to extend a range of retail payment options that seamlessly integrate with core payment systems for settlement. The complete transaction billing, clearing and settlement is compliant with respective scheme rules and local regulations.  Further merchants have on-demand access to relevant clearing and settlement reports for each scheme.   

The clearing and settlement processes have been enhanced to support contactless transactions for supported card schemes. Tap and Pay transactions typically have a low-ticket size, and merchant fees and service charges are proportional to the typical value of the transaction. Merchant Hub can identify and pass the information on contactless transactions to card schemes for streamlined accounting, settlement, and reporting.  

FSS Merchant supports end-to-end incentives management -- definition, payout computation and clearing. Acquirers can define incentives for cardholders, merchants and merchants acquiring entities – sales managers, agents, regional sales managers – along with multiple variables – merchant type, transaction type, real-time or batch mode, periodicity, transaction currency, per-transaction cost, minimum and maximum incentive amount. 

To reduce the overall cost of ownership, FSS Merchant is now compatible with PostgreSQL. FSS Merchant is deployed at leading Tier One acquiring banks and merchant processors to manage operations globally and currently supports one million merchants. FSS supports in-premise, as well as pay-as-you, grow models bundled with a managed services approach.

SME leaders believe it will take on average 12 months for their businesses to make up for lost revenue caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, according to research revealed today by Nucleus Commercial Finance. Over half a million SMEs (590,000) say it will take between 10-12 months to make up the lost revenue caused by Covid-19 and 1.6 million say between 10 months and two years.1 

With the release of pent-up consumer demand following the easing of restrictions last week, medium-sized businesses are most confident about their recovery, with over a quarter (27%) saying it will take them between 7-9 months to return to a pre-COVID financial state. Small-sized businesses are marginally less optimistic, with a quarter (25%) believing it will take them between 10-12 months.  For some, however, the lost revenue from the COVID-19 pandemic is expected to have a lasting impact, with nearly one in five (18%) of sole traders concerned that their businesses will never recover from the lost revenue. 

The research also found that younger business owners (18-34) are more optimistic about making up lost revenue, with 23% hoping to see a recovery in the first 4-6 months, whereas 24% of business owners aged 55+ don’t see their business recovering for at least one to two years. 

Regionally, London and the South East are most optimistic about business recovery. Just short of a quarter (24%) of SME leaders in the South East predict a recovery within 10-12 months, and a quarter (25%) of those in London confidently hope for a recovery in 7-9 months. 

The North West and South West of England remains the least optimistic, with 50% of SME leaders predicting recovery to take 1-2 years. 

Chirag Shah, CEO, Nucleus Commercial Finance comments: “While the trepidations of the pandemic and subsequent restrictions will have lasting effects for many British businesses, it’s encouraging to see such optimism among SMEs about their projected finances as they return to business as usual."

“However, the roadmap out of lockdown will not be without its challenges. As businesses across the country begin to reopen, government and industry must collectively raise awareness of the varying support measures available to aid these businesses in their longer-term recovery, ultimately providing a much-needed boost to our economy.”

Blackstone today announced that private equity funds managed by Blackstone have entered into definitive agreements to acquire a majority stake in Mphasis Limited (NSE: MPHASIS). A wholly owned subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), UC Investments and other long-term investors will co-invest along with Blackstone.

Mphasis is one of the leading providers of Information Technology services specializing in cloud and digital solutions. It has deep domain expertise in the Banking, Financial Services and Insurance sectors (BFSI) and serves 35 of the top 50 US BFSI firms. Mphasis also has long-term relationships with multiple marquee global customers. Mphasis is witnessing strong momentum on new business wins and has delivered its highest‐ever quarterly Total Contract Value (TCV) wins in each of the last three quarters: Direct TCV wins have increased 64% YoY for the nine-month period ending December 31, 2020.

Amit Dixit, Co-Head of Asia Acquisitions and Head of India for Blackstone Private Equity, said: “Information technology and software services have been strong sectors for value creation for the last two decades. Mphasis is backed by strong secular tailwinds as global enterprises increasingly migrate to the cloud. The company is exceptionally well-positioned given a terrific management team, strong order backlog, long-term strategic customer base, deep domain expertise in financial services, and a world-class suite of cloud and digital offerings. This investment enables us to continue creating value for the long term with continuity in the management team and the board, and provide additional resources to further accelerate the company’s growth momentum. We are grateful to Mphasis’ customers, investors, employees and board for their continued support.”

Nitin Rakesh, CEO and Executive Director of Mphasis said: “We are gratified to continue our partnership with Blackstone, both as a leading investor as well as our client. We believe Blackstone’s sustained strategic partnership will help the company accelerate its growth and scale new heights. Sovereign and pension funds co-investing is a testimony of long-term commitment and a vote of confidence of a marquee set of shareholders.”

Satish Swamy, Senior Managing Director Asia and Global Rates, UC Investments (The Regents of the University of California), said: “Blackstone has an exceptional team and franchise in India. An ownership mindset with a business building approach has led to many successful investments including its flagship investment in Mphasis. We have known the company and the management team for a few years and are delighted to now become investors. At UC Investments, we invest as partners with a long-term mindset in companies with secular tailwinds -- Mphasis perfectly fits that bill.”

This transaction will trigger a mandatory open offer for the purchase of up to 26% additional shares of the company from the public shareholders and the acquiring entity has released a public announcement to the stock exchanges. Based on the open offer subscription, the blended purchase price will vary between INR 1,452 to INR 1,497 per share (12-16% premium to 12-month average price and 3-6% discount to 6-month average price) and the purchase consideration will vary between INR 152 billion to INR 210 billion (or, approximately $2.0 billion to $2.8 billion). A different fund managed by Blackstone had acquired a controlling stake in Mphasis from Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE: HPE) in September 2016.

The sale is expected to complete in the coming months, subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals.

Banking Circle, the tech-led licenced bank supporting the cross border flows of Payments businesses and Banks, has announced that Mahir Zaimoglu is joining senior management to, among other areas, assist with the strategic review of monetization options.

Mahir joins with more than 20 years of experience in the financial industry, most recently as Managing Director and Head of Financial Sponsors M&A in EMEA for Goldman Sachs. Previously he headed up JPMorgan’s Sponsor M&A business in EMEA.

Mahir has advised EQT, the majority shareholder of Banking Circle, on several highly successful exits in the past.

Anders la Cour and Laust Bertelsen, Co-founders and Co-CEOs of Banking Circle, said: “We are delighted to have Mahir Zaimoglu join Banking Circle. He brings extensive experience and a highly valuable skillset to the business, which will be important in our continued global growth journey.”

Mahir Zaimoglu added: “Banking Circle is a truly unique business, which is transforming financial infrastructure and cross border payments. I am deeply impressed by what the team has already achieved and equally attracted to the future potential. I am very excited to join Banking Circle for the next phase of its exciting journey.”