In this month's show we discuss the new Regis-TR MED onboarding platform, discuss the state of the market in preparation for the EMIR Refit deadline on April 29th, and go in-depth on financial information services, risk weightings and data management for today's complex B2B financial instruments with Darren Marsh, Senior Product Manager for Risk and Regulatory reporting at SIX Financial Information.
In this month's show we discuss the new Regis-TR MED onboarding platform, discuss the state of the market in preparation for the EMIR Refit deadline on April 29th, and go in-depth on financial information services, risk weightings and data management for today's complex B2B financial instruments with Darren Marsh, Senior Product Manager for Risk and Regulatory reporting at SIX Financial Information.
Hi, I'm Andrew Keith Walker. Hello, I'm Vy.
Speaker 2:Vy Rhee. Hi, I'm Laura Rodriguez.
Speaker 3:Hi, I'm John Curtin.
Speaker 1:Hi, I'm Nick Bruce and this is the number one regulatory reporting podcast in the EU, the UK and around the world. So join us as we go behind the scenes and under the hood to look at the big issues and news stories, companies and personalities who are shaping the world of Rektech, fintech and trade repositories. Welcome to the Registr Roundup. And remember, this podcast is brought to you by Registr, which is a six company, and features members of the Registr team and special guests offering their personal opinions, not the opinions of Registr as an organisation. There is no representation made as to the accuracy or completeness of information in this podcast, nor should you take it as legal, tax or other professional advice. Good Welcome back to the Registr Roundup.
Speaker 1:Yes, we are back for episode three of season 10. Yes, season 10. And what a season it is going to be. It's 2024. And we are quite literally two months away from the deadline when Amir kicks in. That is right, amir refit. He's been working on it for years and it is finally here. So I hope you're on board here. I hope your data is looking spiffy. I hope you have pulled out an additional 70 or so fields or so from nowhere and it's all looking great, but don't worry if not, because we have got the crew here to guide you through it with expert insight and advice under the hood. And, of course, in order to do this, we need the big guns. So, joining us, we have the man who puts the canary in the wharf. He's in Devonshire but never square. He is, of course, the man who handles St Mary's Acts, the none other than our UK CEO, mr John Kern. And John, welcome back.
Speaker 3:Good morning, andrew. Great to be back. Good morning listeners.
Speaker 1:It's good to have you back, john, and you're back in the UK now.
Speaker 3:I am, yeah, we've board meeting on Thursday, so I normally come over, catch up with a few clients, with the team and, yeah, as I said, board meeting Thursday. Back on Thursday night.
Speaker 1:OK, John, good to have you back, but joining John, of course, coming live on direct from Madrid, it is none other than the nicest and most efficient person in the organisation. Of course, the head of client services, Barbara Ruiz Alonso. Barbara, welcome back.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Andrew. Hello everyone, the countdown of refit is ticking and I think we're all excited to see where this will drive us.
Speaker 1:Now, honestly, just to describe it for people at home, I'm looking at the screen here and, barbara, you look serene, you're like Yoda I mean a lot younger, obviously, but you look like Yoda. Now, if it was me and I was client services and I was eight weeks away from the deadline, I'd be sitting there surrounded by ashtrays and empty bottles of gin, but you seem to be in great shape. How is it going? How are you handling the pressure there?
Speaker 2:It's just because I have a great team behind, I have to say but yeah, it's getting busy, it's getting busy.
Speaker 1:I have to say Well, someone who knows all about getting busy. It is, of course, our head of business development, the voice of reason himself, Back. I know you're fresh back from Europe, because so am I. I saw you out there. It is, of course, Mr Nicholas Bruce Nick, welcome back.
Speaker 4:Thank you, andrew, good to be back. And yeah, we bumped into each other at a conference and there was one guy who stood out looking like he was dressed from Goldie looking chain and it was Andrew who would believe it.
Speaker 1:That's right. I put in the special teeth caps as well just for that, which it actually says securities lending in gold across my teeth. When I put that on, I style myself after Flavor Flav, of course, from the legendary public enemy. It was good to see you there, though, nick, because of course we were both moving around the World of Securities, lending and repo and talking about regulations and that amazing moment when you bump into someone you co-host a podcast with when you're out at another event. It was very cool. The podcast whipped out the microphone and we did a little bit there, but it was very noisy in that reception, so probably not such a good idea.
Speaker 4:Absolutely. It's always worrying when you bump into someone and they tell me that they've got a microphone that they can show me. But we'll leave that one there.
Speaker 1:It's true I'm wearing a wire, so to speak, but it's for legitimate journalistic purposes, of course. That's fantastic. Guys Now joining us. Later in the show we have got someone who is going to be throwing more light onto the complexities of sit beside these issues. Here from Six Financial Information, we have a senior product manager in risk and regulation, darren Marsh, joining us. Before we introduce Darren properly and we get on with that part of the show, I think we have to do our Amir countdown. Let's go, yes sorry.
Speaker 1:I couldn't find a TikTok sound so I panicked. I pressed the wrong button. I'm sorry. So moving in, amir countdown. How is it going from your side, nick? You've just been talking to the great and the good across the EU. How is everyone prepped for refit?
Speaker 4:Look, I think we talked about it before. I think there's free states. There's the clients that I've been speaking to who are comfortable, they're well prepared, they've been testing and they're in a really good place. There's others that are slightly nervous and are working their way through it, but they know that they've got a lot of work to do, but they're working diligently to their plan and looking for support. We've got those that are calling up I shouldn't laugh, but we still have them and I've been listening to the calls people next to me picking them up and taking them directly where people are going. Okay, so you want to understand what refit is. That terrifies me a little bit as well, because the clock is definitely ticking, but I think everyone's waking up and everyone's in execution mode now, so it's all guns blazing.
Speaker 1:That is the nature of the beast, though, isn't it? There's so much regulatory change, especially, it seems, this year, that you can't get to it soon enough because you're dealing with the I mean, csdr has just gone. There are more changes depending on what your different business strategies are. You could be refitting regulatory reporting aspects of your business all the time, right.
Speaker 4:No, absolutely. As you said, there's so many different refits that are going on and even past a mere. This isn't the end of the journey, and that's the point is a lot of our clients. Now they're almost well-oiled machines in the fact that they're executing and then they move to the next regime and then they're executing, and it is a constant period of change that they're managing at the moment. I know, John, you had something on this.
Speaker 3:Well, no, I was just going to. Actually I was going to ask Barbara because I think it's interesting what you were saying, Nick that there are a number of clients who are ringing up and asking what is refit. And I was reviewing the MIS pack from Client Services a week or two ago and in that pack you can see an enormous spike in client traffic inbound inquiries since, I would say, probably start December, and it only seems to be going up exponentially. So I was just going to ask Barbara, what's the nature of those types of inquiries? Are there really that many clients who are ringing up and we don't know what this is? What is it?
Speaker 2:Well, there are a number of those, but no many of them are now contacting for all the reporting, the new registration, the adaptation to the new platform, and that's like the first step, and many of them are still there. So not really that they don't know what they have to do, but they are starting to look at the new platform and the new validation tool and they first have to connect with us. And then there are many others that are actually testing. There are racing, things that do not work, questions around how to report certain things. You know the number of increased fields is quite high and this could be seen as something bad because there's more complexity, but on the other hand, many clients before we feed didn't know how to fill in or the reporting information because there was not enough fields in there to populate all the information. So, to be honest, I think there's a wide range of levels.
Speaker 2:At the moment there are no two clients at the same position. The ones that have progressed more on the validations rule might not be yet, on the connectivity side, still connected and there are a few things to be done. As I said before in the previous podcast, it is important that they connect to us in advance. There are multiple changes from the regulation and with all the security issues we had not only Dora, but in general we had to increase our security measures, and so sometimes getting started it's a bit time consuming. So I just encourage everyone to start as soon as possible.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think that was interesting what you said there, Barbara, because I've always taken the view as well that if increased data fields means less ambiguity in the reporting standards, then that's got to be welcome.
Speaker 4:One of the things we've recognized is in the way that we need to empower clients so that clients can source the data they need, or as much of it as possible, centrally and actually come to us where they just need that supplementary information on certain things. So, as we're talking now, it should be live. We've got a rebranded web page for ReFIT, with a lot of tools and resources that are on that web page. So, also just for a class that are listening, I'd urge you to go and look at that as a resource. There's a lot of guides there now that are available for you Just help you to navigate this, to help you with your own project plans.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, Nick, and also we are doing a big effort to plan many webinars so clients can see themselves the important topics.
Speaker 1:Well, that is leading us on as well, isn't it, barbara? You have some news, because one of the issues, obviously, when it comes to any kind of reporting regime, is onboarding and, in fact, generally onboarding across the whole industry when it comes to securities, lending, repo and different platforms and, of course, regulatory reporting. Onboarding is a perennial issue because it can be very complex, it can be time consuming and deadlines. Don't wait for complex onboarding processes, and you've done something to change this, haven't you, registrr? Because there is the new MED platform. Tell us about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, med stands for Master Entity Data, although internally we never call it like that, we just use MED. And what happened here was that RegistrR started offering the ME reporting. Then we went through FIMFRAG, sftr, then the Brexit, and when we were adding new reporting regimes we had to ensure and this is a regulatory requirement that the data was operationally separated to make sure that if something happened on EMI it wasn't affecting other regulations. So we were adding or kind of using the same onboarding processes, but this was adding complexity internally and to the clients, because we required separate credentials for each of the regulations and then internally, if someone forgot the password, which obviously always happens, and even more now that passwords have to be super complex this was creating a lot of effort for clients and for us.
Speaker 2:So MED comes to simplify all the onboarding. Clients will have one single platform to manage all their accounts and users. They will be able to do it by themselves, while so far they had the dependency on our account administration team, and now they will be much more independent. They will not have to wait. If they have forgotten their password at 7pm, they don't have to wait for the following day so someone at the help desk can reset it.
Speaker 2:So I think this is a huge enhancement, because this was really something clients were demanding that you directly log into the web page, type your details and then we will have some colleagues at the back end doing the checks and the acceptance. We, of course, will keep doing all the due diligence, but clients will be able to see the progress, what's left in the process, because so far you didn't know, you provided all the documentation and is this it or what's left Now they see a percentage of the progress they've done. They can see the status of the signatures. All that is providing a lot more information to clients and I think they will evaluate a lot.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think this is really interesting and it's a great thing for our clients. You know, if you want to, I think quite often we ourselves and our clients we bemoan refit, but it's fair to say that refit has also enabled this type of significant client-driven development to happen in parallel as we redesign our platform. So I think that's a positive thing. I think the other observation I had is you know, I'm pretty old and I've spent a long time working in banking organisations and they've been kind of traditionally cautious regarding things like wet ink signatures, physical documentation, etc. Etc. Even though the technology's been there for some time. And I wonder if also, you know, somehow COVID has shifted the mentality on that sort of thing. You know, it's necessity is the mother of invention, sort of thing. So, yeah, they were my observations on it.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think John coming into that, I think I've got maybe two things that I would say. The first one is I would absolutely, you know, confirm you are very old. And the second thing that I would say is, as well, I think you're absolutely right. I mean, this is great. A lot of the developments we're doing it is around the client and with the clients in mind. And you know, last year now, my God, we're 2024. Last year we did our client survey and one of the things we took from that was there were a lot of comments around the technology and the changes that clients would like to see. And we're actually starting to see this now and deliver that to our clients. Med is part of that journey. The new Refit platform as well, and the enhanced platform that you know and the user experience hopefully, will go a long way to addressing those kind of pain points that clients flag to us, especially as they see that Refit platform then get rolled out across all the regulations. So we move to that single platform solution.
Speaker 3:So what we're essentially saying as well, then, is we've refit the implementation of the XML standard, plus our fabulous new Med platform. It's never been easier for clients looking for a great new trade repository to jump ship and join Registria.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I actually didn't say it explicitly, but let me put it very clear for clients, with Med, they will manage all their accounts for all environments, so production environment and UAT environment, the test environment, plus all the regulations. So if I'm an participant and I have to report under Emir and under FIMFRA, or under Emir and the UK, I will have one single login, one like just a pair of credentials to manage all the users. I will just be clicking. There are color alerts where the system is open. We have tried to do it very client friendly, but they will manage everything in one site.
Speaker 2:So the administrator of the account will have kind of all the power. There could be multiple administrators, but it will be much like way easier. And going back to John's point in regards to the security and the electronic signatories, electronic signatories wet ink is indeed getting very old and COVID has definitely, you know, speed up that change and that progression, because we had the time where clients literally had to send the contract from one house to the other house of their colleague until they got all the signatures and then sent it back to us, and I think that was where everybody realized that this was kind of the end. So now electronic signatures are really getting the biggest rate.
Speaker 1:Indeed. Now, of course, if we are talking about engineering the next generation of information products within the B2B industry when it comes to regulatory reporting and financial information, it's time to introduce our special guest. Yes, joining us from six information services, it is all right, simmer down, simmer down. Joining us from six information services is, of course, darren Marsh, who is a senior product manager for risk and regulation products at six, and obviously that sits within the regulation and tax stream of products, which is an interesting one because it gives me a chance to make my fat cut joke, which I haven't made since NEMA, the network managers conference in 2009, which goes along like this Computers are the best way to solve the fat cut problem because computers don't mind going to jail. A little joke for you tax specialists there, because there are obviously some fairly serious penalties if you're the fact officer for a major financial institution and you haven't filed your paperwork correctly there. I do apologize to our listeners and to Nick, who particularly didn't like that gag. I can tell.
Speaker 4:I'm sorry, andrew, I've got tumbleweed blind pass. Let me just clear. Yeah, thanks, I thought it was fantastic, darren, welcome to the show.
Speaker 5:Thank you, andrew, thanks everybody. Thank you for having me and a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 1:Well, it's good to have you along, and it's good to have you along on a show where we are getting into the sort of the nitty-gritty of data and information architectures and the sorts of issues that we have to solve. Registry R has to solve on a regular time, something that is very big, obviously in the text scene where I come from, but perhaps something that maybe our listeners don't know so much about. So I want to come to you with the big question right, which is data is getting more complex and the demands for it is getting bigger and bigger all the time, and we've talked about that sort of sheer complexity and volume of reporting data from here A lot. I mean the fields are increasing from 120.9 to 203. And we've seen increases in data being reported for CSDR. This year. Esma's work plan is looking at Mifid, mephia. We've got Dora, we've got Micah. I mean there's a huge amount of data requirements building for market participants. Tell us what's your view from Six Information Service.
Speaker 5:Well, I mean, first of all, it's really interesting what you said. I mean just looking at some kind of background information from our regulatory think tanks. For example, I think practitioners are now having to juggle with something like 400,000 pages of financial services regulation every year and, as a result, you see a kind of a double in in the costs, almost to something in the region, certainly from an EVA perspective, European regulation around 5.5 million euros. So we're talking about kind of huge demands being made on the practitioners and significant costs that are afforded to them as well as as part of that process. And, as you quite rightly mentioned, there's no slowdown this year. You know you mentioned a few EMEA, csdr.
Speaker 5:Another one, actually a big one, that I'm directly involved in, is Basel.
Speaker 5:So the so-called world, depending on where you are in the world Basel 4, basel 3.1, or Basel Endgame, if you are on the other side of the pond, so to speak.
Speaker 5:But you know, with all of this, you know, we know that firms have to, you know, to juggle all of these competing demands and that's due to an increase in volumes and also more granular information for regulatory supervisory purposes.
Speaker 5:So we have, you know, all of these challenges being able to translate these new reporting requirements into the you know, to granular terms and to changes into the internal models that the banks have to maintain. So you know, in answer to your question, I mean, our perspective is we're dealing with, you know, with the content, so you know, one part of that is being able to provide the information that's you know, accurate and complete and actually appropriate to the specific requirement that it's you know it's being demanded from the regulators for. But there are commonalities across all of these and I think that's where technology comes into play, because then you know, for example, you know a bank is then able to implement an internal data model based on, you know, being able to classify a data attribute if you like, to then be able to present it under the different regulatory lens for each of the purposes that it's required for.
Speaker 1:Now that takes us into the sort of some very complicated areas. I want to get an idea of just how we often think about regulation or reporting regime as being oh, we've just got to supply some extra data, but you do actually need to engineer your systems differently. You have to change workflows internally. I mean, when you mentioned Basel 3, basel N game, which Basel 4, I like N game best, I have to say I hadn't heard that one. I think that's great. This is all about bank stress tests and leverage requirements and collateral and liquidity requirements on a sort of daily basis. So what seems like a sort of a set of numbers changing actually has huge operational impacts across a large market participant, doesn't it?
Speaker 5:Yeah, it does indeed.
Speaker 5:I mean if you, and also if you think about it from the perspective that you know, in order to calculate your risk weights and therefore your kind of capital requirements that you need to hold in reserve for the overall business, you need to derive a lot of content.
Speaker 5:So you need to derive certain classification so that you can bucket them within the correct risk tolerances, and that all requires this kind of industrial strength reference data, but from a number of different points. So you need to understand who the issue is, for example, what the asset class is. But also you need to be able to derive the credit quality steps from the underlying ratings as part of that process. And the kind of the incentive, if you like, is that you know, especially in this you know I'll use end game in the end game environment is you know there is the potential for, you know, higher capital requirements to be implemented at a bank. So you know the idea is here is that really want to optimize that capital and ensure that the you know the amount of adequacy that they hold is accurate and correct.
Speaker 4:And sorry, darren, a question I guess from my side and actually in the back of my head, one of the things driving this is I know we had an exchange last week just about classification of a bond that had been issued and there was a lot of ambiguity around it. Was it public sector debt, was it not? So, looking at the makeup of the company, is there a lot of pressure on sort of view from the financial information side because you're a data source of ensuring that these classifications are correct? Because from a risk-weighted perspective, that can have a huge impact on someone's capital adequacy. You know potentially collateral they're holding, etc. So the downstream implications, and is that getting harder with the more complexity that you see in the marketplace?
Speaker 5:Yeah, absolutely, because you know you will have clients who interpret certain data points differently.
Speaker 5:But you know, and it's not just a data point, because obviously it feeds into other things and it becomes a derived value and it can have a direct impact on the bottom line. You're right, it needs to be correct and that's something that's always a bit of a you know, it's something that we have to kind of judge. So when we implement, for example, our rule sets and methodology, we always follow the regulation. So that's always the first point. So we interpret and we follow all of the kind of all of the guidance that's published.
Speaker 5:What we like to do is to work directly with our clients and regulatory bodies as part of that process so that we can have open conversations about the interpretation, to come to a consensus, a consensus view. And you know I'll say this, it won't always please absolutely every single client that you have, but as long as your underlying rule sets and methodology is clear and ambiguous, then you always have the opportunity to say to the outlier client, if you like, well, look, this is how we interpret it and this is how we come to that conclusion. So we kind of help them to actually identify that specific area, if they don't necessarily agree.
Speaker 2:Darren, what I wanted to ask you is about how do you see that technology and product management or information has to work together? Because, from what you're saying, of course we have to start by the regulation. Regulation has to be first, but then clients and finance tell us that we have to automate things and that technology needs to come to organize all the data to make sure that we comply with the regulation but that we make it efficiently. So how do you see this? What's more important? What comes first and how do they have to work together? Because at the DR level, we see this every day that we have our product specialist, we have the regulation, but then we have to push hard to the technicians so our system works precisely no bugs. You know that everything works as it should Because everything is constantly changing and every day we see more efficiencies or things that we can keep improving. This is like the never ending cycle, right?
Speaker 5:Yeah, I take your point and you're right. I mean it is an efficiency place. So I mean, one of the great things about new technology and the way it's kind of moved on, it allows us to build some of that efficiency into our processes. So an example on our side would be, for example, using natural language technology to be able to extract certain phrases from documentation, from term sheets. But obviously you have to put a lot of work in up front to ensure that the machine learning algorithm is actually processing that information in the correct way, and there's a lot of work to do up front in order to be able to achieve that.
Speaker 5:But that's something that we're always looking out for and there are a number of areas where we've actually deployed that. But again, because, like yourselves, we're dealing with regulatory data or classification generated from the underlying regulatory data, so we need to be sure that we're comfortable with that process before we kind of implement it. I mean, just to give you an idea of looking forward from a more of an innovative perspective, I mean, one of the things that we are working on as well is we're looking at deploying technology that will provide additional analytics and insight into the content that we have being able to present some of the underlying methodology to provide those insights kind of earlier in the business process to our clients. I think will be hugely beneficial and also for customer queries. So that's always a good beginning.
Speaker 2:It's almost like you're providing the answer before that's amazing that's what I was going to say that somehow this is turning to. Technology comes first, because before you can start analyzing all the data and can start building a new system for regulatory purposes, you need to find the right technical structure, because it happened many times that you start building a system for something that then it doesn't fit because you have so much more data that the system cannot manage and all that. So I think we are now at the point where, in my opinion, technology has to come first. At least you know the structure, like what data structure we have to use, what we will be looking at in the future, what's the amount of data we have to manage, what's the scalability of this, because the system has to be also scalable at the same level. So this is to me like, it's beautiful, right Like, and it's very complex actually.
Speaker 4:Yeah, completely. I go along with that. I think the challenge as well is because you've got more and more data. The challenge is how can you navigate it as well? How can you effectively navigate that data to quickly pull out the information you need? It's funny that it's completely unrelated to the conversations we've had.
Speaker 4:I've been talking to some other people in financial information. They introduced me to a company that you're working with around chatbots and using chatbots to quickly go in and to actually pull out set information and I know from my side we're looking at that and it's well. How can we use that from our side as well and look, the requirement to pull data quickly is only increasing because regulatory reporting times from our side they're shortening. So if the client has a huge pressure to be able to get that source information quickly and to be able to report it correctly, and that goes down the chain if you're doing securities financing traits, you need to be able to look at the collateral, you need to be able to classify, you need to be able to look at your portfolio to maximize it, and that is all around the immediacy of the data itself. So that's huge pressure now that we're getting and automation is the only solution to that.
Speaker 1:Darren, there is, from a product management point of view, a challenge here. Isn't there, because it's not like you can roll out a product the way that Google does or Microsoft and if it doesn't work, roll it back or do incremental updates and what have you? When you're a financial institution, when you roll that product out, it's got to be reliable, because it comes with a much heavier legal overhead attached to it that you can't launch a product for market participants. That doesn't quite work right, because then we get banking meltdowns and fines and all sorts of problems. So what are your data management disciplines there and your product development disciplines to engineer things to a very, very high level of reliability?
Speaker 5:Well, as I mentioned before, you always have to start with the regulatory text.
Speaker 5:There's kind of no getting away from it, and that's the expectation of our clients.
Speaker 5:But again, I mean, I know I mentioned before that we would work closely with our clients as part of that.
Speaker 5:But then, by the same token, because we are almost the production end of the process, we recognize that there will be different kind of distribution platforms and different ways for our clients to actually process their information, and that could be through third party platforms, third party software systems, et cetera. So we also work very, very closely with partners in that regard, in that we are able to deploy and make available the information as and when it's required through third parties into the business process on our client side. So that's kind of the way that we would approach that from distribution perspective. So then, the only thing on us to make that as seamless and as quick and as timely as possible. So we'll adapt different distribution methods, so obviously we'll distribute via the cloud, using APIs, et cetera. So the idea being that we can provide that information on a demand basis, so that no one's kind of waiting for an element to be processed before they can actually get on with their day job.
Speaker 1:Now these, of course, are the issues that you can control. What I want to talk about now is the issues you can't control because, let's face it, things are changing out there. We've had a year of unprecedented volatility and change when it comes to the value of assets, the value of bonds In particular. Obviously, we've seen a huge spike in repo transactions. We know that, for example, the Bundesbank has stopped remunerating government deposits, so there's 70 billion or so euros which are now entering the money markets and need to get repoed out, reverse repoed out. There's a huge amount of excess liquidity out there. Banks are concerned about their collateral requirements on a sort of day basis. It feels like everything has got a lot busier and the value and weighting of assets has changed. So I mean, has your job turned into trying to manage ever changing and increasing volumes information compared with a few years ago, when everything seemed very stable?
Speaker 5:Well, I mean, there's no lead up in the volume. You're absolutely right. So what we need to do is obviously have more efficient and optimal ways of processing that information, because we need to. First of all, we need to collect and collect that, aggregate that information. It may come from many, many different sources. It does come from different sources. What we prefer to do is, if we can take it direct from source, then obviously that's great, but by the same token, we're also using alternative sources. As you know, there are now many more sources of unstructured data as well as structured information that needs to be translated, it needs to be aggregated in a way that can be processed by the clients and the client systems. So these are things that we have to deal with on a daily basis. Yeah, and that's what we again. So, using the, by deploying automated processes and new technologies, that's one way that we can leverage those to our benefit and to the mutual benefit of our clients.
Speaker 1:When we talk about automated processes and publicly available data, I mean there is a huge amount of it out there, isn't there? I mean, I think at our last Registry R event we had the Bank of England join us and they were talking about the huge volumes of data that are coming in, that are being used every day by central banks to look at market conditions and adjust monetary policies for stabilized conditions. There's vast amounts of data out there. Nick and I were to talk just a couple of weeks ago where someone from the ECB was presenting how much cash ECB cash is out there in the sort of the EU 27, and how they're reducing that. Interestingly, though, when they went to look at their sources, no one mentioned SFTR data and the amount of data that's out there. So how do you manage data sources now? Do you have a sort of a team whose focus is identifying the sources of publicly available data to help you get a better idea of where systemic risk lies or where certain assets are riskier than others?
Speaker 5:Well, I mean, our fundamental approach is to support the instruments that our clients invested. So we're a global business. We cover something like 20 million individual instruments globally. So that's certainly our main focus. But within that you mentioned public sources of data. But they're not all public and they're certainly not all in a user-friendly format so that they could be disseminated and produced into data feeds for our clients.
Speaker 5:So there's a hell of a lot of work that kind of goes into that process to be able to normalize that. I mean. I suppose an interesting example of this is with some of the ESG data points. So we've got a situation whereby regulation has been implemented and I'll just take the example of the EU. So you've got SFDR and you've got the EU taxonomy, for example, but you don't necessarily have all of the data inputs that go into that, because the CSDR which, sorry, I've swallowed an acronym of Dictionary this morning, as you can probably tell but the CSDR isn't kind of established yet and it's going to be established over a period of time, so not all companies will be in scope from day one.
Speaker 5:So you kind of have this situation where clients have to retroactively populate the various different data fields that are being required by a regulator for a different purpose, and it's not all available. So then you have to can, I say, aggregate information from public sources, from private sources, but again, they're not all going to be. Not everybody speaks in the same language, so you're not going to have a consistent view of those data. So you have to make decisions as part of that and ensure that you can present the information in a way that makes sense to you as a business and also enables you to meet those regulatory requirements as well. So you need to satisfy the regulators.
Speaker 2:So, darin, this is something very interesting, I believe, and make me think about the timeline or the time spread between when you decide to publish some information, because you're saying there's always more information coming. There are multiple sources. You have to aggregate that, you have to filter it for your business, but sometimes we see reports from ESMA, like one two years ahead, like today, with data of 2021 or 2022, which seems kind of old, but I guess it's the time they need to actually aggregate all the information from all the sources. So this is kind of a big time right, because I mean, of course, it is relevant and for us at the PR level it is of major importance. But I wonder you know, for the front desks, what's the expected timeline for you to be publishing the data?
Speaker 5:Yeah, I suppose, because the old ad is not all data are created equally. You will require the same information, but for different business processes, different parts of the organization, with different time frames, different levels of quality. So you're quite right, and I think it's always a trade-off between how long do you retain information to ensure that it's as perfect as possible, versus releasing that information earlier. And, as you say, in a front office situation the requirements would definitely be different than they are from a back office perspective, whereby they can rely on. They could potentially wait until that information is published.
Speaker 5:At the end of the day, there will be intraday requirements from a risk management perspective, but, as you say, the front office is going to want that information instantly. We do have to manage that it becomes. I think most of it is down to kind of experience and making the calls, but also, as I mentioned before, it depends a lot on the source. So if you are taking information directly from the source, via a feed, for example, then the expectation, especially if it's publicly available, as far as supervisory search, for example, then the emphasis will be on you have to trust that information more than you would if you were taking it directly from a specific term sheet. So you're quite right, there are differences and it is my data ops colleagues will tell you it's one of the many challenges that they have to maintain.
Speaker 1:So, darren, we now come to the crystal ball section of the show. It's all sound effects this week, and let's start looking a little bit towards the future, because, of course, we've been very focused on Amir. We will be focused, no doubt, on Dora and Myka and other regimes as they start to dominate the headlines, but right now everyone's got their nose down for the April 29th deadline. The Amir refit, but looming in the background is T plus one. This is going to be a move across the EU. Esmer has said it's a question of when, not if, and a lot of the industry is talking about it. Does that make much difference to you to settlement times and those sorts of things that affect information services? Do you need to be able to deliver data faster? Do you mean to harvest it faster, or is it business as usual from the information services side?
Speaker 5:Yeah, I would say it depends on the area of information that you're working in. I mean, obviously, from a settlement perspective, we're moving to T plus one. There is the requirement for those information, that data, to be available more quickly than it is currently. That's one part of it. I'm not sure if I see as much of an impact on, for example, producing reference data if you like, because that process will remain the same. But certainly the interesting thing, I think, is that we do have this move to T plus one in North America. So you could say that for us in the UK and in Europe more broadly, we do have the potential to understand and see the process of how that rolls out. So we're in a lucky position in a way in that we can keep very close to that process. Obviously, we need to service our clients in that area and we've done all of our due diligence and we ensure that everything runs smoothly at the switchover. But certainly, from a European perspective, if there are any lessons to be learned, then obviously we have that slight advantage.
Speaker 1:Okay, and one more crystal ball question for you, darren. I'm sorry, sound effects are just too good to waste. This week. We have an unprecedented year of change ahead, don't we? There's over 60 general elections taking place globally in democracies this year. Obviously, all eyes especially on what's going to happen in October in the US. We're anticipating increased ongoing volatility from in markets, geopolitical risk, energy prices, those sorts of things. Does this changing environment mean that you are sort of having to develop new data products to cover areas that you haven't had to cover before?
Speaker 5:Well, I mean, I gave the example before of the ESG space, so that, for me, is a really good example of something that we haven't had to cover until quite recently.
Speaker 5:I would say yes, there's always the potential for more data to be onboarded. I mean, as far as volumes and complexity is concerned. It's only going in one direction, as we know, and there are. One thing that's really encouraging is we're now seeing regulators recognise or they have in the last couple of years, really recognise the impact on our client institutions and they're actually taking action to introduce things like integrated reporting, to kind of try and ease the burden and, if you like, take off some of the strain of aggregating all of these various different reports. But certainly, from our perspective, we have to provide the information that our clients need and want. At the end of the day, we have to bake that into their investment processes, into their overall trading clearing processes as well, as part of that. So as these new data become available, we will certainly be sourcing them, we will be aggregating them and providing them in an accurate and consistent manner, as we do today.
Speaker 1:Thank you, fantastic. Okay, now that is it. We have to draw the show to a close now, but I think we all want to give a huge virtual studio Registry R Roundup round of applause to the senior product manager for risk and regulatory Reporting products at six financial information services, darren Marsh. Darren, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 4:Thank you, Darren.
Speaker 1:And, of course, we have to give a huge thank you to our virtual studio crew, who are in no particular order. Was this week the nicest and most efficient person in the organization, brava Uisalonso, head of client services.
Speaker 2:Thank you, andrew. Thank you, darren, it was a pleasure to have you here.
Speaker 1:And also the man who put the canary in the wharf. He was Devonshire but never square. Now he's holding St Mary's accident. Of course, mr John Kern, ceo Registry R UK, thanks.
Speaker 3:Andrew and again, thanks so much, Darren. Really interesting to listen to.
Speaker 1:But last and never least, the voice of reason himself, a man who's had to change rooms twice during this recording because it's so busy. Now you should see him Podcasting on the go live and direct as he's going down the corridors. The voice of reason himself. Head of business development, mr Nicholas Bruce.
Speaker 4:Thank you, Andrew. Yeah, I feel like the littlest hobo, like I haven't got a home. I'm just keep walking around from room to room. Thankfully no one listening to this can see it, but huge. Thank you, Darren. Really appreciate you coming on it. It's been really interesting to listen to what's going on your side as well.
Speaker 1:I don't forget, until tomorrow you'll be freeing to roam. There you go. That's, you have to be a certain age to get that gag, but if you remember it, good for you you're nearing retirement. Okay, on that front, it's time for us to title together. I just have to say, obviously, if you want to find out more about the topics we've discussed today, do join us on our LinkedIn page that is linkedincom slash companies. Slash Regis hyphen to you, where you'll be able to network with Nick and with Barbara and with John and with Darren and with everyone else At the six group and find out all about what's going to be coming up on our next show there. And in the meantime, for me and Ricky Walker from Leana Sudan, our producer, from everyone here in the six virtual studio, have a good month, have a safe month and we'll see you in a month. And remember that clock is definitely ticking for your countdown, so get your emir on.
Speaker 4:You.