Today Nasdaq, Inc. revealed a new agreement with Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEX) to upgrade the technological infrastructure of Hong Kong's main derivatives market, including trading, clearing and real-time risk management technologies. The agreement also extends the existing relationship for an additional five years. HKEX and Nasdaq have been technology partners since 1994. 

Under the agreement with HKEX, Nasdaq will deliver a new multi-asset trading technology engine (Nasdaq Multi Matching Engine), a state-of-the-art multi-asset derivatives clearing engine and a real-time risk management solution (Nasdaq Clearing Engine and Nasdaq Real-Time Risk), which will increase performance, speed, flexibility and resiliency of trading and clearing. Further, the new platform will address the sophisticated risk management and stress testing needs of today's CCPs and exchanges to manage risk of financial derivatives such as equity, FX, commodities and fixed income asset classes, all under the new Nasdaq Financial Framework architecture. The upgrade is expected to be completed in the second half of 2018. 

"We have been able to provide superior capability and very reliable market infrastructure, high priorities at HKEX, with the Nasdaq technology we use in our derivatives market," said Richard Leung, HKEX's Co-Head of IT.  "We look forward to completing our upgrade smoothly and receiving continued high quality technical support from Nasdaq." 

"Nasdaq is proud of the technology partnership that has existed between our respective organizations for nearly 25 years," said Lars Ottersgård, Executive Vice President and Head of Market Technology, Nasdaq. "HKEX is one of the global capital markets' true innovators who are committed to the continuous introduction of new technologies to bolster and strengthen the product and services offerings for their clients and partners, along with a rigorous focus on shaping the future of our industry. We are thrilled to support HKEX on this journey and further our relationship in the years to come." 

The architecture that HKEX's derivatives market will run on, the Nasdaq Financial Framework, is designed to ensure openness, flexibility and the capability of supporting HKEX's requirements. The solution comprises of a number of seamlessly integrated Business Applications across the trade lifecycle that leverage a single, operational hub. For post-trade operations, the Nasdaq Clearing business application is fully integrated with the Nasdaq Matching Engine, which will allow HKEX to benefit from a more harmonised approach. Additionally, the Nasdaq Financial Framework is built to accommodate continuous change, which allows seamless integration with other third-party trading and post-trade systems, thus supporting a reduction of the total cost of ownership (TCO). 

Nasdaq's exchange technology, including trading, clearing, CSD and market surveillance systems, is in operation in over 100 marketplaces across the Americas, Europe, Asia, Australia, Africa, the Middle East and the Caribbean. 

WoraPay, the mobile service provider that allows customers to beat the queue when ordering food and drinks, has integrated Masterpass, the global digital payment service from Mastercard.

Masterpass, will allow users of WoraPay’s mobile wallet WioPay to pay with a secure, one-click payment. Masterpass stores all payment information, including card details from Mastercard and other payment networks, in one convenient, secure place. The partnership was established through the Startupbootcamp FinTech programme, where WoraPay was mentored by Mastercard employees. Lloyds Banking Group staff are among the first to use the service following the partnership established also through the Startupbootcamp FinTech programme. 

WoraPay’s service allows customers to buy food and drink and pay in advance with their mobile. This means customers can order their morning coffee or tea whilst travelling to the office. Customers are notified when the order is ready and they can simply collect it en route to their desk, avoiding waiting times and improving the customer journey. With Masterpass, this journey is now even quicker.

Vaidas Adomauskas, CEO and co-founder of WoraPay said: “We are very excited to improve the payment experience for our clients providing them with the opportunity to use Masterpass.  For example, Lloyds Banking Group staff using the WoraPay service could save up to 75,000 hours per year; the equivalent of over 10,700 working days that would otherwise be spent waiting in line to pay. We are also seeing that the caterer is experiencing an uplift of 5% in total sales as customers return to vendors that improve their overall experience. We are sure that the integration of Masterpass will add to this success.”

Scott Abrahams, SVP, Business Development, Mastercard commented: “Thousands of busy office workers can now benefit from the speed and simplicity of paying with Masterpass. We’ve been able to work together with WoraPay to solve this customer pain point – waiting in line to order and pay. We mentored WoraPay through the Startupbootcamp FinTech programme and it’s a great example of how larger players in the market can work with innovative FinTech companies to benefit consumers.” 

WoraPay customers who store their payment details on Masterpass can use the service seamlessly at 340,000 other retailers across the world. WoraPay’s mobile order, shop and pay service is being used by caterers serving other financial institutions, as well as high street brands, who will also have the possibility to use Masterpass.

Francisco Lorca, MD for Startupbootcamp FinTech London program added: “WoraPay’s partnerships with Lloyds Banking Group and now Mastercard are great examples of how FinTech startups can add real value to financial services offered by incumbents. We are thrilled that our program is a great catalyst to enable these partnerships to happen.”

A survey of 1000 UK SMEs, commissioned by cloud accountancy software Pandle, has uncovered that six out of ten UK SMEs are confident in the government's ability to negotiate trade deals, and over one in three think that brexit will positively impact their business.

In light of the recent triggering of Article 50, almost half (47%) of UK SMEs feel that they’re being rushed to prepare for Brexit, however 56% stated that the government is doing enough to support them. Similar findings have been published in The SME Growth Tracker report, which highlighted SMEs’ growing confidence - with businesses now forecasting a 2.3% rise in revenue growth.

While the majority of SMEs are confident in the UK government's ability to negotiate trade deals, over four in ten (41%) are concerned that importing will become more difficult post-Brexit and that the deadlines set won’t be met. This issue will become a focal point in the negotiations as SMEs make up 99% of the businesses in every main sector in the UK and one in three (32%) small businesses are involved in overseas trade as importers and/or exporters, with the vast majority of these businesses trading with the EU single market.

“It’s important that the Brexit negotiators keep SMEs top of mind during the talks,” said Lee Murphy, owner of Pandle. “SMEs are the lifeblood of the UK and Brexit could easily make or break some of these businesses, especially when considering the tariffs that the EU may place on imports and exports.”

Today Crawford & Company, the world's largest publicly listed independent provider of claims management solutions to insurance companies and self-insured entities, reported the appointment of Kieran Rigby as president of international, encompassing the United Kingdom, Europe, Asia-Pacific and Latin America regions. 

Rigby was previously CEO of GAB Robins UK until Crawford acquired the company in 2014. Since then, Rigby served as CEO Crawford Europe and Latin America. In his new role, he assumes additional responsibility for the Asia-Pacific and United Kingdom regions, and he will serve as a member of Crawford's Global Executive Management team (GEM). 

"I'm confident Kieran is the right person for this role," said Harsha V. Agadi, president and chief executive officer. "His character promotes both innovation and inspiration, and with his proven track record of leadership and success, I believe he'll continue to grow our company and build for the future. I look forward to the new ideas and fresh focus he'll bring to Crawford's leadership team."

Rigby, who will be based in London, will report directly to Andrew Robinson, global chief operating officer, and will be responsible for growing the business, continuing to strengthen Crawford's global capabilities and realigning the company's operating model for further efficiency and profitability across the company's international businesses.

"Crawford's global presence, strength and breadth of capabilities is unmatched by others in the marketplace," Robinson said. "We are excited to have Kieran lead, grow and further develop our operations, as well as pursue new and innovative ways to serve our clients.  I look forward to working with Kieran as we realize these ambitions." Rigby's appointment follows the resignation of Ian V. Muress, CEO international, after 16 years of dedicated and loyal service to the company.

"We would like to thank Ian for the contribution he has made to the business and for his commitment to our clients," said Agadi.  "We wish him well as he moves to the next stage of his career."

"It is a great honor to be given this opportunity," said Rigby. "This is an exciting time for Crawford & Company. It is also a time to critically examine all parts of our operations to grow our revenue and presence in the marketplace - a marketplace that is rapidly changing and requiring our constant innovation."

Throughout his career, Rigby has served in senior leadership positions in claims and loss adjusting, and he's also active in the industry, holding excellent professional qualifications, including Fellow of the Chartered Insurance Institute, Chartered Insurance Practitioner, Fellow of Chartered Institute of Loss Adjusters and past president of the Federation of European Loss Adjusting Associations.

The Central Bank of Iceland has chosen SIA - European hitech company, leader in payment infrastructures and services - to implement and support the new realtime gross settlement system and the new instant payment platform. 

These technology infrastructures developed by SIA, planned to go live in 2018, will replace CBI’s current mainframe-based real-time solutions for high and low-value payment systems, which have been operating since 2001. SIA will use its wholly-owned subsidiary Perago, based in Pretoria (South Africa), specialized in central bank solutions.

Central Bank of Iceland manages all interbank payments in the country. Despite the small population, it processes a quite significant daily volume of transactions: up to 1 million payments with a peak of 160,000 per hour. CBI has decided to move towards a more strategic, modern and cost effective infrastructure.

CBI will be able to benefit from seamless integration among Perago’s RTGS, Instant Payment and Payhub solutions. Furthermore, CBI will differentiate itself from standard models that traditionally split high and low-value payments, byimplementing a new model based on a single system which processes each type of payment (Bank to Bank, P2P or B2B) in a different way, while ensuring that all transactions can be exchanged using a single domestic message standard. This new approach puts CBI at the forefront of the payment system infrastructure evolution.

Guðmundur Kr. Tómasson, Director of Financial Market Infrastructure at Central Bank of Iceland, said CBI decided to accept the bid from SIA after thorough consideration: “We look forward to using SIA’s systems, which will also enable us to cooperate closer with our Nordic neighbors in this field.”

“We are honored to have signed this agreement with Central Bank of Iceland, confirming us as leading provider for central banks in the Nordic region after Sweden, Norway and Denmark – commented Massimo Arrighetti, CEO of SIA – With CBI, the number of central banks in the world which have decided to use SIA’s state-of-the-art technologies to develop their own payment infrastructures has risen to 15, across Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Oceania. We are also very pleased to implement for the first time an instant payment system completely managed by a central bank”.

BioCatch, the global leader in behavioral biometrics, announced today that it has teamed up with Experian, the leading global information services company, to integrate its behavioral biometric technology into the company's fraud and identity platform, CrossCore™, to help prevent new account fraud for its users.

Global B2B payment solutions provider and virtual card specialist Optal is delighted to announce it has been placed seventh on the inaugural FT1000 list of Europe’s 1,000 fastest growing companies. Compiled by the Financial Times and market analyst Statista, the list is the result of many months of research, during which more than a million outstanding European enterprises were appraised.

To be placed seventh in such auspicious company is an outstanding achievement for Optal and recognition of the tremendous success of Optal’s payment solutions in the global B2B payments space. Optal’s focus has always been on optimising B2B payment processes.

Optal does that primarily through its core offering: A Virtual Account Number (VAN) payment solution that automatically generates single-use Mastercard numbers to facilitate quick and easy payments, accepted wherever Mastercard is online.

Through this and other innovative solutions, Optal has been able to reinvent how payment processes work across a number of complex industries, including travel and construction. For Optal customers the results have been outstanding, helping them reduce risk, improve reconciliation, and boost profits and payment efficiency. Optal might have been named seventh on the FT1000 list, but the firm has its sights set firmly on continuing its stellar growth.

Optal expects to soon complete the acquisition of innovative B2B payments business Invapay, which will help significantly expand its capabilities to offer organisations a one-stop-shop for corporate B2B payables needs. Optal also recently teamed up with fast growing e-trading platform provider Open ECX, in a move, which will help efforts to expand in the B2B construction market.

“We’re delighted to have been placed seventh on the prestigious FT1000 list. It’s yet another sign of the tremendous value Optal is offering customers across a growing range of industries and recognition of the hard work put in by our global team and our strong relationships with our key business partners,” said Rob Bishop, Optal’s Managing Director & CEO.

“While we’re thrilled with this milestone, we’re looking forward to continuing our growth by applying our innovative solutions for customers in an ever-growing range of sectors” comments Andrew Downes, General Manager.

For those organisations that still see Artificial Intelligence (AI) as an emerging technology that they probably don’t have to start thinking about yet, customer contact technology specialist Sabio has a wake-up call: AI is here already and busy powering many of the best practice customer journeys. 

To help businesses take advantage of the opportunities enabled by AI, Sabio has identified ‘7 key AI technologies that can deliver customer engagement benefits today’. Deployed correctly, these technologies are available to support all aspects of the customer journey, from understanding customers and simplifying processes through to eliminating bad demand and freeing agents to respond to customers directly.

 “Given all the inevitable hype around AI – particularly around the rise in robotics and jobs destruction – it’s hardly surprising that for many businesses there’s still some caution,” explained Daniel Whaley, Principal Solutions Manager for Digital at Sabio. “However, rather than seeing AI as a potential threat to activities, organisations need to recognise the potential power of AI in
supporting all aspects of customer engagement.” “Analyst firm Gartner has already predicted that by 2020 some 85% of customer touch points will be offered without human assistance, however 2020 really isn’t that far away and we’re finding that a growing number of organisations are keen to find out how they can take advantage of AI and machine learning within their own operations,” he
added. 

Sabio’s 7 Key AI Technologies that can deliver customer engagement benefits today: Predictive Intelligence Technology – Allows organisations to take advantage of machine intelligence to improve the customer experience. This is achieved by bridging the gap between digital channels and contact centres and providing contact centre agents with immediate insight into a caller’s related website activity both before and during calls. Virtual Assistant Solutions – With analyst firm Gartner predicting that the number of customer interactions handled by a virtual assistant is set to grow 10x over the next three years, there’s clearly going to be increased demand for conversational virtual assistants.

This technology can optimise the experience offered based on where customers are in their journey and their individual preferences. Conversational Commerce Technology - With continued improvements in natural language understanding, voice control is on its way to becoming ubiquitous, particularly as research suggests that customers prefer automated interactions where they can speak directly to an AI-enabled assistant or a chatbot. However, for successful conversational experiences, organisations also need to have access to the right IVR, natural language, UX and customer journey design skills.

Human-Assisted Service – AI-enabled customer service needs to work both ways: recognising both when a human agent is needed to help the customer, and also when an agent might benefit from some additional support. Understanding where and when this is necessary, and successfully managing the hand-offs between AI and human service will
prove increasingly critical.Speech Analytics - The latest speech analytics solutions take advantage of real-time analysis and machine learning to deliver contextual guidance. This has the potential to alter the outcome of interactions while a caller is still on the line. 

Cognitive Artificial Intelligence – By applying the Big Data captured in millions of customer conversations, organisations can use machine learning techniques to look beyond their most common engagement scenarios to leverage the more complex ‘long tail’ contact reasons that until now have been too difficult to automate. Voice Biometrics – Biometrics technology has been using neural nets for a long time to provide organisations with a more natural, effortless way of authenticating customers securely by allowing them to use their voice as their password. New facial recognition technology is also now being paired with voice biometrics to broaden the scope of AI-enabled authentication solutions. 

Today the European Banking Authority revealed a Report on the Peer Review carried out on its ITS on supervisory reporting aimed at assessing how supervisory authorities have ensured its consistent and comprehensive implementation.