February 15, 2023 | "Irreverent, but never irrelevant" | | | John Lothian Publisher John Lothian News | |
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Hits & Takes John Lothian & JLN Staff The CFTC canceled the Open Meeting scheduled for today. It said the matters under consideration are being handled through "the Commission's seriatim process." OK, I had to look that one up. It means: taking one subject after another in regular order; point by point. The FIA is holding an FIA Forum in Hong Kong on April 13 at the HKEX Connect Hall. For details and to register, click HERE. The CME Group's OpenMarkets online magazine has an interesting story about one of my favorite commodities with an interesting angle; "Oats: From the Original Energy Contract to Trendy Dairy Alternative." The story is by Emily Balsamo. Oats were used to feed horses, which we used for transportation and even industry before the advent of the internal combustion engine. AND NOW A MESSAGE FROM YOUR OVERLORD. That is what the tweet should say, but Elon Musk tweeted out "Please stay tuned while we make adjustments to the uh ... 'algorithm.'" Bloomberg reports the story, titled "Musk Forced Algorithm Change to Help Boost His Tweets, Platformer Says." Such are the benefits of owning a social media platform. And so much for eliminating bias in the platform, as Musk has said he was going to do. Some things you can't make up. You would have to take all the headlines, put them in a big jar, mix them up and pull out three of them to combine into one story. That is what we have in a NY Post story about an FTX executive, a gambling scandal, and Rep. George Santos. The headline from the Post is "Ex-FTX exec linked to online poker scandal donated $5,800 to George Santos." The lead to the story says: "Daniel Friedberg, the former FTX 'chief regulatory officer' linked to an infamous online poker cheating scandal, also gave the maximum possible donation to Rep. George Santos during the disgraced Republican's successful bid for Congress." If you have ever wanted a herd of rhinos, here is your chance. The world's largest private rhino owner plans to auction his 2000 rhinos in April, Johannesburg's Beeld newspaper reported. Jeffrey O'Hara is now the deputy director, Office of Energy Policy and New Uses at USDA. He previously served as a senior economist at the Chicago Climate Exchange. Have a great day and stay safe and treat people the same way you want to be treated: with respect, equality and justice.~JJL ++++ ICE warns CFTC about commodity market intervention Radi Khasawneh - FOW The chief operating officer at Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) has warned the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission's market advisory committee against intervention in commodity markets like the one into the European gas market. Stuart Williams gave the example of the European natural gas price cap mechanism, implemented this month, as an example of an "unhelpful" intervention. He was talking at a global markets advisory hearing in Washington on Monday. "We should not legislate for the sake of doing so," Williams said. "We've seen a rather unhelpful implementation of a price cap in the futures market in Europe, it is well publicised that the European Commission, the European Securities and Markets Authority and Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators all disagree as the regulatory bodies in Europe on that implementation. We certainly don't see that that is going to have any positive impact on the market, if anything it could have a significant negative impact." /jlne.ws/3YRcrA5 ***** FOW opens up an important story from behind their paywall. ++++ America's Priciest Neighborhoods Are Changing as the Ultra-Rich Move to Florida Alexandre Tanzi, Felipe Marques, Michael Sasso and Amanda Albright - Bloomberg Miami's Star Island has long lived up to its name. From Shaquille O'Neal to Rosie O'Donnell, the exclusive enclave only accessible by gated bridge has drawn the rich and famous for decades. And yet, Ken Griffin's move south from Chicago has launched the neighborhood into a new stratosphere, and turned it into a microcosm of the shift in demographic and housing trends across the US. /jlne.ws/3jRKBVH ***** If everyone moves to Florida, will the United States start to tip to the southeast? This is different from the "tilt theory," where the United States is tilted and all the nuts roll to California.~JJL ++++ Bakkt Backs Out of Consumer Business to Focus on B2B Offering Andrew Asmakov - Decrypt Digital assets platform Bakkt today announced it will sunset its consumer app to focus on direct interaction with businesses, providing them "with crypto and loyalty experiences for their customers through SaaS and API solutions." The app will be officially discontinued on March 16. "We are sunsetting our consumer App because it is not core to our B2B2C approach," Bakkt's Chief Sales & Marketing Officer Mark Elliot told Decrypt. /jlne.ws/3RWRyRT ****** Bakkt has been a brand in search of a mission. Here comes plan Z.~JJL ++++ FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried remotely accessed his TV in the Bahamas to watch the Super Bowl Molly Crane-Newman - New York Daily News Days after a federal judge shot down a request by FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried to loosen his technology restrictions while on house arrest, the disgraced crypto entrepreneur remotely accessed his TV set in the Bahamas to watch the Super Bowl. A lawyer for Bankman-Fried, who's awaiting trial on a $250 million bond in an ankle bracelet at his parents' Palo Alto, Calif. home, addressed his use of hidden internet networks in a 2 a.m. Tuesday court filing after Manhattan Federal Court prosecutors told the judge they'd discovered it with a pen register on Bankman-Fried's Gmail account. /jlne.ws/3YOlyBx ****** I apologize for calling Sam "slippery" yesterday. Apparently after posting $250 million to bail him out, his parents could not pay the cable bill, or they are streamers and did not have access to FOX to watch the Super Bowl. Luckily, Sam's Bahamas TV bill is still being paid. Or, this is all just a good cover story for using a VPN, but it is a good one. ~JJL ++++ Tuesday's Top Three Our top story Tuesday was Sam Bankman-Fried's Super Bowl VPN Use Prompts Government Concern, from CoinDesk. Second was Cboe Europe Derivatives to Expand into pan-European Single Stock Options, from Cboe. Third was a tie between Binance suffers worst day since December as crypto crackdown escalates, from The Telegraph and Turning offices into condos: New York after the pandemic, from the Financial Times. ++++ MarketsWiki Stats 27,198 pages; 242,898 edits MarketsWiki Statistics ++++
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Lead Stories | More risk, fewer rules: the plan to revive the City of London; Ministers and financiers hope 'Big Bang 2.0' can be a blueprint for the post-Brexit era. But will its equity markets ever attract big tech companies? Daniel Thomas - Financial Times Just before Christmas, UK prime minister Rishi Sunak arranged a bilateral video conference with Masayoshi Son in another attempt to persuade the powerful SoftBank boss to bring the chip design firm, Arm, back to the UK stock market. People involved in the call describe the conversation between the politician and Son, whose investment company acquired Arm for $32bn in 2016, as positive. Sunak, the third prime minister to try and persuade SoftBank to consider relisting Arm in London, talked of the importance of the firm and how the UK wanted to become a tech superpower. Son, in turn, recognised the significance of the Cambridge-based tech success story to the UK. /jlne.ws/3XxlFQQ Booming Oil Exports Boost U.S. Role as Global Price Maker; Trades of key Texas-crude contracts hit record high David Uberti - The Wall Street Journal The world's oil traders are increasingly adopting an old slogan as they track crude prices and try to shield themselves from volatility: Don't mess with Texas. Traders swapped contracts for oil sold in Houston and Midland, key hubs of the Texas export boom, at a record clip on Feb. 8, according to exchange giant CME Group CME 0.64%increase; green up pointing triangle. By Monday, the number of outstanding agreements for such crude deliveries sat at a record high. /jlne.ws/3YPo0b1 A war for climate talent is hotting up; Financial firms are targeting sustainability specialists ahead of new rules on greenwashing and environmental risk Pilita Clark - Financial Times In 2017, Eugenie Mathieu was a senior Greenpeace campaign strategist in New York, trying to stop ancient forests being chopped down to make toilet paper. A year later, she was back in her home city of London helping to run a natural capital investment fund at Aviva Investors, the asset manager. This is by no means a conventional career path in the City of London. At least, it wasn't. /jlne.ws/3XAjlbT ECB to Scrutinize Banker Bonuses That Don't Take Account of Risk Nicholas Comfort - Bloomberg The European Central Bank will scrutinize banker bonuses after finding that compensation structures at many lenders don't take sufficient account of risk. The indicators used by banks to set bonuses aren't always clear and "in many instances" rely too much on financial performance instead of risk, controls or cultural and behavioral aspects, the ECB said in a newsletter article on Wednesday. European lawmakers and regulators have pushed banks to change compensation practices and rein in risk-taking to prevent a repeat of the 2008 financial crisis, which many saw as precipitated by greed and lack of proper risk oversight. Yet banking executives have said that has put their firms at a disadvantage to US peers and some academics have also faulted the European system as being too blunt. /jlne.ws/3HZLTFT FTX Negotiates for Return of $400 Million From Obscure Hedge Fund; The founders of the trading firm Modulo Capital are in talks with FTX about returning the investment that Sam Bankman-Fried made in the fund. Matthew Goldstein and David Yaffe-Bellany - The New York Times After the cryptocurrency exchange FTX collapsed last year, bankruptcy lawyers, federal prosecutors and forensic investigators embarked on a global hunt to recover billions of dollars in lost deposits and repay the firm's customers. /jlne.ws/3xve22F Binance Hires Gemini Executive as Chief Compliance Officer; Noah Perlman most recently served as Gemini's chief operating officer Mengqi Sun - The Wall Street Journal Binance said Noah Perlman has joined as its chief compliance officer from rival Gemini Trust Co., as the cryptocurrency exchange continues to beef up its legal and compliance team amid regulatory scrutiny. Mr. Perlman joined Binance last month after serving as Gemini's chief operating officer for more than two years. He joined Gemini as its chief compliance officer in 2019. /jlne.ws/3S0hBHE Central banks currencies are coming whether we want them or not. Should you be worried about CBDCs? Ryan Gladwin - Fortune In countries around the world, central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) are poised to change the way average citizens use money. In the coming decade, billions of people are likely to use CBDCs-a new type of currency run on a centralized ledger-to do everything from pay taxes to buy groceries to receive welfare checks. /jlne.ws/3lqzX8v The Creeping Menace of Central Banks' Crypto Dreams; Digital currencies are for government regulation, not participation. Marcus Ashworth - Bloomberg Should the state be in the payments business? It's a simple question but that is in essence what a central bank digital currency would amount to. A digital pound, dollar, euro or renminbi is not some token with illusory investment upside that is implied by monikers such as "Britcoin." CBDCs are more akin to stolid stablecoins rather than currencies. Unfortunately, their potential to erode free enterprise is all too real. Controlling how, what and when money is transferred is not a place government bodies should be competing, with a massive advantage, against the rest of the monetary system. /jlne.ws/3Sgccwx Binance CEO: BUSD Is Not Issued by Binance CoinDesk Binance's Chief Executive Officer Changpeng "CZ" Zhao distanced himself from the Binance-branded stablecoin BUSD, after regulatory action caused minting to cease. "BUSD is not issued by Binance," CZ said at a Twitter Spaces on Tuesday. "We have an agreement to let them [Paxos] use our brand, but that's not something that we created." "The Hash" panel discusses the latest developments and industry implications amid mounting U.S. crypto regulatory pressure. /jlne.ws/3E9IaVn Powell Takes Home the Same Paycheck as the Average Wall Street Associate Paulina Cachero - Bloomberg Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell may have the power to move markets with a single word, but he takes home the same paycheck as the average associate on Wall Street. Powell, 70, discussed his annual salary in a Q&A session with Carlyle Group Inc. co-founder David Rubenstein last week, sparking a flurry of social-media commentary about whether the man leading the US central bank is underpaid. While Powell said he believes his pay of "around $190,000" is fair, others have argued that his wages don't reflect his role leading an organization that serves as the gatekeeper of the world's largest economy. /jlne.ws/3EaT110 Banking Group Asks Treasury to Withdraw Ownership Database Proposal; American Bankers Association says the proposal is 'fatally flawed' Dylan Tokar - The Wall Street Journal The American Bankers Association was one of the biggest proponents of a new corporate ownership registry, saying it hoped the project would help cut regulatory costs for its members. But the industry group on Tuesday made an about-turn, attacking the U.S. Treasury Department over how it plans to manage a key part of the database. The ABA in a letter said a proposal by the Treasury related to who will have access to the database was "fatally flawed" and should be withdrawn. The letter is a rebuke from a key supporter of the registry, which lawmakers hope will limit the use of anonymous shell companies. It comes as the Treasury bureau tasked with creating the database faces resource constraints, delays and a lawsuit. /jlne.ws/3jSlouh DBS Exchange Says Bitcoin Trading Surges 80% Amid Crypto Winter; Bourse has benefited from flight to safety, CEO says; Security-token efforts were put on hold due to volatility Joanna Ossinger - Bloomberg DBS Group Holdings Ltd. reported an uptick in Bitcoin trading volume on its digital exchange last year amid a broader decline in cryptocurrency prices. The number of Bitcoin traded on the DBS Digital Exchange surged 80% last year, while the number in custody as of Dec. 31 more than doubled from a year earlier, according to a statement Wednesday. /jlne.ws/3S2MpYz $50bn credit fund caught on both sides of distressed debt dispute; Angelo Gordon's positions differ in contested Revlon and Serta Simmons bankruptcies Sujeet Indap - Financial Times Angelo Gordon, one of the world's savviest corporate credit investors, has found itself on both sides of a contentious divide roiling Wall Street. The $50bn fund manager is a longtime lender to Revlon, the cosmetics company, and to Serta Simmons Bedding, the mattress group. Each company is in US Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings after falling behind on debts. /jlne.ws/3InB2qO StoneX Group appoints new senior vice president of prime services sales; New VP brings considerable experience in prime services sales to StoneX Group, having previously held similar positions at Sova Capital and Linear Investments. Wesley Bray - The Trade StoneX Group has appointed Gary Clifford-Newman as senior vice president, prime services sales, The TRADE can reveal. Clifford-Newman joins the firm from Sova Capital, where he most recently served as director of prime services sales, following nearly three years as vice president of prime services sales. /jlne.ws/3XzINhw Tech glitches should not be the cause of stock exchange outages in this day and age; Sylvain Thieullent, CEO of Horizon Software, has strong feelings on why technical exchange glitches simply should not be happening in today's digital environment. Sylvain Thieullent - The Trade Did anyone else get a funny sense of déjà vu when the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) suddenly cancelled trades after "technical glitches" with its opening auction triggered wild price swings in the likes of McDonald's and ExxonMobil? From Knight Capital in 2012 to Euronext in 2021, over the past decade, all kinds of "glitches" have occurred and in every single case, investors have only been able to respond based on what the exchanges have been willing to communicate. /jlne.ws/3Ka7ZrT Why More and More ETFs are Moving to the NYSE Trading Floor; ETF Central speaks with Douglas Yones, ChFC, Head of Exchange Traded Products at the NYSE to understand this important industry trend. Tony Dong - ETF Central Last year's dark horse ETF trend - and one we're seeing carry through into 2023 - wasn't the launch of meme ETFs like the inverse Cramer ETF or the MeetKevin ETF. Rather, it was the decision of numerous issuers to migrate their ETFs from the NYSE's electronic trading platform, Arca, to the actual exchange floor. /jlne.ws/3IpR03L
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Ukraine Invasion | News about the invasion of Ukraine by Russia and its military, economic, political and humanitarian impact | Russia's tanks may face 'disadvantageous conditions' in a battle with US-made Abrams tanks, Russian expert says Michael Peck - Insider Russia's tanks are inferior to the M1 Abrams that the US is sending to Ukraine, according to a top Russian defense expert. In addition, Russia is short of modern anti-tank missiles and armor-piercing shells for tank cannons that are needed to defeat the Abrams and other Western tanks. "Even in export versions, the Abrams M1A2 SEP v.2 variant significantly outperforms any Russian production tank," Ruslan Pukhov, director of the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, a Russian think tank, told the Russian newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets. /jlne.ws/3K7gjJ2 Vladimir Putin is about to win the ammunition war against the West Jack Watling - The Telegraph 'The current rate of Ukraine's ammunition expenditure is many times higher than our current rate of production," Jens Stoltenberg, Nato's secretary general, said this week. "This puts our defence industries under strain." In two sentences he confirmed a major hitch in the West's efforts to support Kyiv, one that experts have been highlighting since the first months of the war: we are running out of supplies. /jlne.ws/3XCnpYZ Russian general takes his own life after being sacked by Vladimir Putin James Crisp - The Telegraph A Russian general who led a suppression of opposition activists shot himself in the head after being sacked by Vladimir Putin. Maj Gen Vladimir Makarov, 72, was found by his wife Valentina with gunshot wounds just weeks after he was fired by the Russian president in late January. Police have ruled that his death was the latest in a string of suicides among high-ranking Russian security and military figures. /jlne.ws/3KcvH6X Western intelligence shows Russians amassing aircraft on Ukraine border Felicia Schwartz and Henry Foy - Financial Times Western intelligence shows Russia is amassing aircraft close to the border with Ukraine, an indication that Moscow is preparing to throw its jets and helicopters into the war to support a stuttering land offensive. The fear of a looming air war in Ukraine has prompted allies to prioritise rapid shipments of air defence assets and artillery ammunition to Kyiv, western officials said, to respond to the shift in approach by Moscow as the almost year-long war enters a new phase. /jlne.ws/3E8BTcy U.S., NATO see Ukraine in urgent need of more arms, Zelenskiy says speed crucial Sabine Siebold and Andrew Gray - Reuters Ukraine urgently needs more military aid, the United States and NATO said on Tuesday, pledging that western support will not falter in the face of a new Russian offensive as the war was about to mark the first full year since it began. Western defence chiefs met in Brussels to discuss new arms provisions to Kyiv, which is pleading for greater firepower, and maintenance of existing supplies including shells whose production can hardly keep pace with the war. /jlne.ws/3k5REtH Russia Has Deployed 97% of Army in Ukraine but Is Struggling to Advance, U.K. Says; U.S., allies gather for a second day of talks on boosting supplies to Kyiv Isabel Coles and David Luhnow - The Wall Street Journal The U.K. said Russia has deployed nearly its entire military in Ukraine, increasing pressure along the front line in the east of the country but falling short of a breakthrough. Ukrainian officials have warned of a renewed Russian onslaught to coincide with the first anniversary of Moscow's invasion next week. But some Western officials say the offensive is unlikely to be one single event. Russian forces have redoubled attacks along the front lines in eastern Ukraine in recent weeks, eking out gains after a series of reversals last year. /jlne.ws/40XXXjx Central Bankers in Bunkers Keep Ukraine's War Economy Afloat; Monetary policy chiefs across the world have had a tough 12 months, but nothing compares with trying to run a financial system from a bomb shelter. Volodymyr Verbyany and Michael Winfrey - Bloomberg The deputy governor of Ukraine's central bank woke early on Feb. 24 to a phone call from his mother, who was abroad. Her flight back to Kyiv had been cancelled. She'd also seen news reports that Russian tanks had crossed the border. Minutes later, Serhiy Nikolaychuk was racing to the office for an emergency meeting. Thus began a year in which he and his colleagues - more accustomed to supervising banks and targeting inflation from the peaceful confines of a boardroom - would find themselves managing a war economy by pulling monetary policy levers as much in hope as belief. /jlne.ws/3lssN3C EU Sanctions Aim to Make Banks Divulge Frozen Russian Assets; The bloc is discussing a 10th sanctions package against Russia; EU also proposes sanctions on Alfa Bank, Rosbank, Tinkoff Bank Alberto Nardelli - Bloomberg The European Union is poised to force banks to report information on Russian Central Bank assets as part of the bloc's latest sanctions package targeting Moscow for its war in Ukraine, according to draft proposals seen by Bloomberg. mGetting a handle on the scale of central bank and other sanctioned state-backed assets that have been immobilized in the EU is seen as a first step to exploring options to potentially using those funds to contribute to Ukraine's reconstruction. /jlne.ws/3YvLPEN Swiss Say Confiscating Russian Assets Would Undermine Law Hugo Miller - Bloomberg Switzerland said confiscating frozen Russian assets and providing them for the reconstruction of Ukraine would go against the constitution, in a move likely to be welcomed by the country's banks. A working group led by the Swiss Federal Office of Justice concluded that the "confiscation of private Russian assets would undermine the Federal Constitution and the prevailing legal order," the government said in a statement on Wednesday. Support for Ukraine will continue, it said, regardless of this conclusion. /jlne.ws/3jXj591
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Exchanges, OTC & Clearing | Top news from exchanges, clearing, settlement and trade execution facilities | Borsa Istanbul Group's Aid To Earthquake Victims Borsa Istanbul Group Taking action immediately after the earthquake, Borsa Istanbul Group delivered 5 trucks of humanitarian aid and 3 trucks of vehicles and equipment consisting of generators and rotary hammer drills for search and rescue operations, and electric and tube heaters for the heating needs of earthquake victims to Kahramanmaras, Adıyaman and Hatay, within 2 days, in line with the demands from the earthquake area and in coordination with AFAD. /jlne.ws/3xm4IOG CME Group to add bitcoin futures to its suite of event contracts CME Group - Seeking Alpha CME Group (NASDAQ:CME) will add bitcoin (BTC-USD) futures to its suite of event contracts starting on March 13, the derivatives exchange said Tuesday. "Our new event contracts on Bitcoin futures provide a highly transparent and less complex way for investors to access cryptocurrency markets" with the added benefit of a fully regulated platform," said Tim McCourt, global head of Equity and FX Products at CME Group. /jlne.ws/3K8FjiX NSE signs a Data Licensing Agreement with CME Group for WTI Crude Oil and Natural Gas contracts NSE India's leading stock exchange, National Stock Exchange (NSE), has signed a data licensing agreement with CME Group, the world's leading derivatives marketplace, allowing NSE to list, trade and settle rupee denominated NYMEX WTI Crude Oil and Natural Gas (Henry Hub) derivatives contracts for Indian market participants. The addition of NYMEX WTI Crude Oil and Natural Gas (Henry Hub) contracts will expand the NSE product offering and its overall commodity segment. NSE has applied to the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) seeking approval to launch the additional futures contracts. /jlne.ws/40Y75Vn New futures contract referencing Euro STR successfully launched at Eurex Eurex Eurex started trading in its new Three-Month Euro STR Futures referencing Euro STR. The launch marks an important milestone in establishing Euro STR as the new benchmark risk-free rate and expands Eurex's EUR-denominated fixed income product offering. Eurex's Three-Month Euro STR Futures are based on the compounded Euro STR over a three-month period. They provide a listed, centrally cleared, and cash-settled solution for trading or hedging the new risk-free rate and complement Eurex Clearing's Euro STR Overnight Index Swap offering. /jlne.ws/40YLBbe Euronext launches the BEL ESG index; Designed to meet sustainable investment needs, the new BEL ESG index tracks the Brussels-listed companies demonstrating the best Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) practices; Relying on Sustainalytics data, the index is fully compliant with the 'Towards Sustainability' label by the Belgian Central Labelling Agency (CLA) Euronext Euronext today announced the launch of the BEL ESG index, a new index identifying and tracking the companies within the BEL 20 and the BEL Mid indices that have demonstrated the best ESG practices. /jlne.ws/3I24h14 ICE Fills Gaps in Fixed Income ESG Data Shanny Basar - MarketsMedia Anthony Belcher, head of sustainable finance at ICE, said the exchange has been filling one of the big gaps in environmental, social and governance data which was fixed income and the link to securities issuance. Belcher told Markets Media that market participants have been very focused on equities in sustainable finance and ESG, so Intercontinental Exchange saw fixed income as one of the big gaps. "We can map a company's ESG data to its fixed income issuance and cover 1.4 million debt securities," he added. "Clients can now look at ESG from a multi-asset perspective as we also cover municipal bonds and mortgage-backed securities." /jlne.ws/3XzDoXM Cboe Global Markets to Launch Cboe One Options Feed, A New, Real-Time U.S. Options Market Data Solution Cboe Global Markets Consolidated, real-time U.S. options pricing from the largest U.S. options exchange operator; Through a single market data feed, Cboe One Options Feed will publish aggregated BBO of all displayed orders for securities traded on Cboe's four options exchanges; Aims to meet investor demand for a cost-effective alternative to existing offerings Cboe Global Markets, Inc. (Cboe: CBOE), a leading provider of global market infrastructure and tradable products, today announced it expects to launch the Cboe One Options Feed, beginning March 1, 2023, subject to regulatory approval. Through a single market data feed, the new data offering will provide a comprehensive, real-time view of U.S. options pricing derived from the largest U.S. options exchange operator. /jlne.ws/3YPlGAB Re: The CFTC Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on Reporting and Information Requirements for Derivatives Clearing Organizations CCP12 The Global Association of Central Counterparties ("CCP12") is the international association for CCPs, representing 41 members who operate over 60 individual central counterparties (CCPs) across the Americas, EMEA, and the Asia-Pacific region. CCP12 appreciates the opportunity to respond to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission ("CFTC" or "the Commission") Proposed Rulemaking on Reporting and Information Requirements for Derivatives Clearing Organizations1 ("the Proposed Rulemaking", "the Proposal") and commends the CFTC for gathering further information and industry feedback on this important topic. Regulatory reporting is essential information that Derivatives Clearing Organizations ("DCOs") provide to regulators to ensure the proper oversight of these often systemically important financial market infrastructures. /jlne.ws/3YKao0Q ASX: Change Of Company Secretary Mondovisione ASX advises that Lucy Barnett has resigned as a Company Secretary of ASX Limited effective 17 February 2023. Johanna O'Rourke continues to act as Company Secretary of ASX Limited and as the person nominated under Listing Rule 12.6 for communication with ASIC in relation to Listing Rule matters. /jlne.ws/3Eb5z8R Final Director's Interest Notice ASX Information or documents not available now must be given to ASX as soon as available. Information and documents given to ASX become ASX's property and may be made public. /jlne.ws/351gPmZ Cboe Australia Announces Planned Retirement Of CEO Vic Jokovic, Appoints Emma Quinn As Successor Cboe Global Markets Cboe Australia ("Cboe Australia") today announced the planned retirement of Cboe Australia CEO Vic Jokovic, effective March 31, 2023. Industry veteran Emma Quinn has been appointed as his successor and will assume the position of President, Cboe Australia, as of March 27, 2023. Mr. Jokovic will remain in an advisory role to help ensure a seamless leadership transition and will also continue in his current board roles with Cboe Australia and other members of the Cboe group. /jlne.ws/3EblVhz Event Report - Japan-Southeast Asia Market Forum Japan Exchange Group As the first activity based on the MOU between Japan Exchange Group, Inc. (JPX) and the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO) signed on November 7, 2022, an international economic forum titled the "Japan-Southeast Asia Market Forum" was held in Singapore on November 15, 2022, jointly hosted by the two parties. The Forum featured prominent speakers from Japan, including Yasutoshi Nishimura, the Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry; Tomoko Amaya, Vice Minister for International Affairs, Financial Services Agency; President and CEO of the Tokyo Stock Exchange and others from government agencies, financial institutions and start-ups in the region to provide overseas investors, entrepreneurs and others with an overview of the "now" in Japan. /jlne.ws/3jXUeSu Exclusion Of The New 30-Year Bond From The 30-Year Government Of Canada Bond Futures Montreal Exchange Bourse de Montreal Inc. (the "Bourse") wish to inform you that it will exclude the newly-issued 30-Year Government of Canada ("GoC") bond from the 30-Year GoC Bond Futures ("LGB") June 2023 delivery basket, irrespective of whether this Bond eventually satisfies the delivery standards for this contract expiry. /jlne.ws/3IpIj9p NSE Indices launches Nifty SDL Oct 2026 Index NSE NSE's index services subsidiary, NSE Indices Limited today launched a new target maturity index Nifty SDL Oct 2026 Index. The Nifty SDL Oct 2026 Index follows a target maturity structure with maturity date of October 12, 2026. It includes State Development Loans maturing during six month period ending October 12, 2026. /jlne.ws/3k1oJa8 News and Events TAIFEX TAIFEX's Key Business Plans for 2023; In tune with the upward trajectory with more than 384 million contracts traded in 2022, Taiwan Futures Exchange (TAIFEX) outlines its key business plans for 2023 to further the market competitiveness, efficiency, safety as well as sustainability. /jlne.ws/3YQuRRp CME Group to Launch Event Contracts on Bitcoin Futures on CME Group CME Group, the world's leading derivatives marketplace, today announced it will expand its suite of event contracts to include Bitcoin futures on March 13, pending regulatory review. /jlne.ws/3In1ssx
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Fintech | A roundup of today's market tech news and a look at tomorrow's disruptors | US fintech FIS to spin off Worldpay payments business James Fontanella-Khan and Ortenca Aliaj - Financial Times US-based financial technology group FIS has said it will spin off Worldpay, the payments business it acquired for $43bn just four years ago, after it failed to successfully integrate the two companies. Formally known as Fidelity National Information Services, the company acquired Worldpay in 2019 to create one of the largest providers of financial infrastructure that underlie the bank payments sector. FIS said on Monday that the tax-free split it was pursuing would unlock shareholder value, contrasting arguments made when it combined the groups that "scale matters in our rapidly changing industry". /jlne.ws/3K83WfI Fintech giant's bad wedding leads to happy divorce Anita Ramaswamy - Reuters Many mergers fail, but executives are rarely humble enough to admit it. At Fidelity National Information Services (FIS.N), purveyor of software to banks, it's taken a new boss to bring on a shift. Appointed in December, Chief Executive Stephanie Ferris's first major move at the helm is to undo a $43 billion deal the company made four years when it bought payments processor Worldpay. /jlne.ws/3lvZVaF Why Meta Is Missing The Boat On Asia's Fintech Boom Zennon Kapron - Forbes Meta makes almost all of its revenue from advertising. The company has long known it needs a new engine of revenue growth, but it waited too long to introduce payments and explore fintech in general. In Asia, where fintech growth has generally been much faster than in Meta's home market of the United States, the company has faced market barriers in some cases and intense competition overall. At this point, it may be able to gain some payments market share in certain Asian countries with WhatsApp Pay, but it will be an uphill climb. /jlne.ws/3lz0lNE Solaris Setback Spells Trouble For European Fintech Scene Meaghan Johnson - Forbes Solaris, the German Bank-as-a-Service (BaaS) provider, confirmed that it will face a "permission proviso" with the Germany regulator, BaFin. Implemented in December 2022 and announced in January 2023, the bank will need approval from the regulator before onboarding any new customers, a restriction that will likely impact its pan-European ambitions. The news confirmed what many European seed-stage fintechs looking for a banking partner have known for months; launching a digital finance product with the German BaaS is now nearly impossible. /jlne.ws/3SgeV9f Southeast Asian fintech Aspire seals $100mn to fund growth Alex Clere - FinTech Magazine Aspire, a Singapore-based fintech that provides financial services to businesses, has raised US$100mn in an oversubscribed Series C funding round. The round includes participation from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital SEA, Paypal Ventures, LGT Capital Partners and existing backers Picus Capital and MassMutual Ventures. Aspire will use the money to enhance its product offering further, build out its team and expand its regional presence. /jlne.ws/3I26OrZ Allen & Overy introduces AI chatbot to lawyers in search of efficiencies; Magic circle law firm adopts much-hyped tech to help draft legal documents, but insists move will not replace jobs Kate Beioley and Cristina Criddle - Financial Times Allen & Overy is introducing an artificial intelligence chatbot to help its lawyers draft contracts, as the magic circle legal firm seeks to adopt the much-hyped technology to find efficiencies for its lawyers and clients. The London-based group told the Financial Times it had rolled out a chatbot named Harvey after testing it since November for use in tasks such as drafting merger & acquisition documents or memos to clients. /jlne.ws/3YvPUZD
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Cybersecurity | Top stories for cybersecurity | The cost of cybersecurity insurance is soaring-and state-backed attacks will be harder to cover. It's time for companies to take threats more seriously Shmulik Yehezkel - Fortune State-backed cyber attacks are on the rise-but they are not raising the level of alarm that they should in the corporate world. When working with companies, my team often encounters executives who say they have insurance, so everything will be alright. Or, they say they are not likely to be targeted by state-backed attackers because their company doesn't have any political or strategic importance. /jlne.ws/3YvVfAs Cybersecurity High-Risk Series: Challenges in Protecting Privacy and Sensitive Data U.S. GAO Federal systems are vulnerable to cyberattacks. Our High Risk report identified 10 critical actions for addressing federal cybersecurity challenges. In this report, the last in a series of four, we cover the 2 actions related to Protecting Privacy and Sensitive Data: /jlne.ws/3RZpZHk The first national cyber director's last day is today Tim Starks - The Washington Post Chris Inglis ends his tenure today as the United States' first national cyber director amid widespread, bipartisan praise, leaving command of his office to acting director Kemba Walden. Inglis departs after serving in the role since July 2021, and his exit comes as cyber observers eagerly await the publication of the Biden administration's first national cybersecurity strategy, which Inglis's office began writing last year. That makes it a doubly sensitive moment for the White House office. /jlne.ws/3YIHAWm New Year, More Cybersecurity Concerns: What To Expect In 2023 Mike Wilson - Forbes Despite the pandemic seeming to ease slightly, 2022 was another year plagued with unknowns and disruption. From global conflict and cybercrime to ongoing supply chain challenges, the only certainty appears to be uncertainty. And as expected, in the world of cybersecurity, bad actors continued to take advantage of the disruption and exploit vulnerabilities. /jlne.ws/40USom5 Ransomware gangs force cybersecurity teams to reassess Shmuel Gihon - SC Media Ransomware attacks mushroomed during the pandemic and now continue to grow. Before March 2020, there were four major ransomware groups operating at any one time and today there are around 20. Competition has become fierce among ransomware groups and there's a high mortality rate. Just as LockBit 3.0 replaced Conti in 2022, newcomers such as BlackBasta, BianLian, and new-kid-on-the-block Royal are now all seriously vying for LockBit's crown in 2023. /jlne.ws/3EbeuqF Royal Mail hackers demanded £65mn ransom; Cyber-attackers release version of stalled talks over pay-off, with UK postal group at risk of data release Mehul Srivastava and Oliver Telling - Financial Times The LockBit hacking group that encrypted Royal Mail data sought a £65.7mn ransom from the company, a demand that the postal group's board appears to have rebuffed, setting the stage for a potential large-scale leak of company information. Negotiations with the hackers fell apart after more than three weeks of back-and-forth that included discussions of Royal Mail revenues and the company's business challenges, according to a log of the conversations released by LockBit. /jlne.ws/3Ec0YTU
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Cryptocurrencies | Top stories for cryptocurrencies | Ken Griffin's Citadel Securities Discloses 5.5% Stake in Crypto Bank Silvergate Brandy Betz - CoinDesk Market maker Citadel Securities has disclosed a 5.5% stake in Silvergate Capital (SI) worth about $25 million. According to a Form 13G filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Citadel Securities is now the owner of roughly 1.73 million shares or a 5.5% stake in Silvergate, valued at $25 million based on Monday's closing price of $14.71. /jlne.ws/3RWRuBD Binance Hires Former Gemini-Exec as Chief Compliance Officer: Bloomberg Jamie Crawley - CoinDesk Binance has hired Noah Perlman, former chief operating officer (COO) of fellow cryptocurrency exchange Gemini, as its new chief compliance officer (CCO), Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. Perlman started in the role at Binance in January, having spent two and a half years as COO of Gemini and previously one year as CCO. /jlne.ws/3Ini4k8 Binance CEO Distances Himself From BUSD Stablecoin as Regulators Act Jack Schickler - CoinDesk Binance Chief Executive Officer Changpeng Zhao distanced himself from the Binance-branded stablecoin BUSD after U.S. regulatory action caused minting to cease. On Monday, BUSD issuer Paxos said it would stop minting new tokens following a request from the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS), but denied regulators' claims the cryptocurrency, pegged to the value of the U.S. dollar, constituted an unregistered security. /jlne.ws/3YLw38C Binance Withdrawals Surge as Paxos-BUSD Drama Weighs on the Exchange Krisztian Sandor - CoinDesk Binance, the world's largest crypto exchange by trading volume, has endured some $831 million of net outflows in the past 24 hours, according to blockchain intelligence firm Nansen's data. Investors appear to be spooked by a regulatory crackdown on the Paxos-issued Binance USD (BUSD) stablecoin and so are reducing their holdings on the platform. /jlne.ws/3YLwUGh Three Arrows Gives Crypto Another Try; Also Elon Musk Twitter fraud, LDI mark-to-market or not, meme-stock governance and corporate politics. Matt Levine - Bloomberg High on the list of crypto's most impressive accomplishments is the ability of crypto finance to convince people to lend money, at very high loan-to-value ratios, against collateral that is somewhere between "extremely risky" and "transparently worthless." We have talked repeatedly about the time Sam Bankman-Fried said to me, on a podcast, that in crypto you can build a box and issue tokens from the box and "put [the] token in a borrow lending protocol and borrow dollars with it" and "never, you know, give the dollars back." /jlne.ws/3Yw8ml5 Crypto Trading Platform Talos Announces Tie-Up With Payment Services Provider BCB Group Will Canny - CoinDesk Digital assets trading platform Talos will work with crypto payment services provider BCB Group to provide clients of both firms with access to a suite of front-, middle- and back-office trading services, the companies said in a statement Wednesday. /jlne.ws/3K7ZJbU Sam Bankman-Fried, Caroline Ellison, and Other Company Insiders Subpoenaed by FTX for Documents Sam Reynolds - CoinDesk FTX company insiders including Sam Bankman-Fried, former Alameda CEO Caroline Ellison, Bankman-Fried's father Joseph Bankman, as well as Gary Wang and Nishad Singh have been served subpoenas by bankruptcy administrators. /jlne.ws/3xn2PBc Nomura's Crypto Arm Invests in Institutional Hybrid DeFi Protocol Infinity Exchange Krisztian Sandor - CoinDesk Japanese investment banking giant Nomura's digital asset subsidiary, Laser Digital, has made a strategic investment in institutional-grade decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol Infinity Exchange, the firms announced Wednesday. /jlne.ws/3YzoJgC Bored Ape Owner Burns $169K NFT to Move It From Ethereum to Bitcoin Andre Beganski - Decrypt A valuable digital collectible was permanently removed from circulation over the weekend, as its owner aimed to symbolically shift the asset's underlying blockchain from Ethereum to Bitcoin. The collectible was Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) #1626, an Ape from the most valuable project in the NFT space. Its most recent sale on OpenSea took place last November when it sold for 108 Ethereum-that's nearly $432,000 at the time of the transaction, or around $169,000 at today's prices. /jlne.ws/3E9aB5v
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Politics | An overview of politics as it relates to the financial markets | Influential local US banks fight back against Republicans' ESG attacks; Moves at state level are hindering efforts to blacklist institutions accused of disadvantaging oil and gas companies Patrick Temple-West - Financial Times US Republicans hoping to quash environmental, social and governance investing in state capitols are running into opposition from influential local banks, jeopardising their efforts to blacklist financial institutions accused of disadvantaging oil and gas companies. At least 49 anti-ESG bills have been introduced across the country this year, according to a February 8 report from law firm Ropes & Gray, while about 22 were introduced in 2022. /jlne.ws/3XrPXVa 'Nightmare Isn't Over:' Senators Are Hopping Mad and Demanding Answers for the Crypto Collapse Mack DeGeurin - Gizmodo Lawmakers from opposing parties disagreed over who and what was truly to blame for a devastating crypto crash that left customers collectively burnout out of billions in losses during a Wednesday Senate Banking Committee hearing. While Democratic lawmakers and crypto skeptics warned of the dangers presented by a lack of meaningful oversight measures, Republicans pushed back, with some blaming part of the recent tumultuous chaos on the Securities and Exchange Commission's alleged failure to use regulatory powers already at its disposal. /jlne.ws/3XrDn8x Elizabeth Warren is building an anti-crypto army. Some conservatives are on board. Zachary Warmbrodt - Politico Sen. Elizabeth Warren is branding herself as the scourge of crypto. And she's not doing it alone. The progressive Massachusetts Democrat is starting to recruit conservative Senate Republicans to her anti-crypto cause and getting some early positive vibes from bank lobbyists, who also want to rein in digital asset startups. /jlne.ws/3RZH0RL Nicola Sturgeon quits as Scotland's first minister; Authority as SNP leader has weakened in recent months Lukanyo Mnyanda and Sarah Provan - Financial Times Nicola Sturgeon has resigned as Scotland's first minister and leader of the Scottish National party after a backlash over her strategy for securing independence and a fall in popularity over proposed gender laws. Sturgeon, who has led the SNP for eight years, told a press conference in Edinburgh that giving everything to the "best job in the world" was the only way, but that intensity could only be maintained for so long. "For me that is now in danger of becoming too long," she said. /jlne.ws/3Ka6kTq EU's $100 Billion Debt Orders Show Investors Are Favoring Havens; Bloc gets bids of more than 13 times its EUR7 billion sale; Preference for safer debt comes as corporate bond rally stalls Priscila Azevedo Rocha - Bloomberg More than $100 billion of orders have flooded in for the European Union's latest bond offering, a sign that investors want the safety of haven assets as they turn pickier on new debt. The EU saw the blowout demand for a combined EUR7 billion ($7.5 billion) sale of its existing 2029 and 2042 notes on Tuesday, according to a person with knowledge of the sale. The orders for more than EUR93 billion are 13 times the amount on offer, one of the highest of any deal in Europe this year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. /jlne.ws/3K9Hcw6 France's Hydrogen Pipeline With Spain Is at Risk Over Green Rules; Paris pushes to classify nuclear-produced hydrogen as 'green'; Debate on hydrogen production methods weighs on BarMar plan Ania Nussbaum, Alonso Soto and Petra Sorge - Bloomberg A spat over defining "green hydrogen" may jeopardize a flagship project to pump hydrogen from Barcelona to Marseille and then onto Berlin via pipeline. After a recent victory in Brussels for renewable hydrogen made in countries with a low-carbon energy mix, France will keep pushing for nuclear energy to be considered a clean source of hydrogen in ongoing negotiations about the European Union's green targets, according to officials at the French energy transition ministry. /jlne.ws/3xnrS7l Putin's gangster state is crumbling - a return to Russia risks changing that Matthew Lynn - The Telegraph It probably won't be next year, or even the year after that. It might even take as long as another decade. Even so, Cees 't Hart, the chief executive of the Danish brewing giant Carlsberg, last week raised the possibility of returning to Russia one day, even as the company completes the exit of its existing business there. /jlne.ws/40VDPyE Russia Put 6,000 Ukrainian Kids in Re-Education Camps, Yale Study Finds; Children were subjected to Russian propaganda, researchers say; Some of them were forcibly adopted by Russian families: study Iain Marlow - Bloomberg Russia has placed thousands of Ukrainian children in camps where they're subjected to Russian propaganda and forcible adoption by Russian families, with some even undergoing military training, a US government-backed report from Yale University found. /jlne.ws/3lxiZFz China Warns of Retaliation Against US Entities in Balloon Saga; Beijing will 'take countermeasures' against the US: official; Blinken, Wang could meet on sidelines of Munich conference Bloomberg News China warned that it will retaliate against the US over violations of its sovereignty, potentially escalating a lingering dispute just as top diplomats from both nations plan to attend a security conference in Germany. At a briefing Wednesday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin repeated Beijing's view that the Chinese balloon downed by a US jet off the South Carolina coast this month had inadvertently floated over the country after being blown off course. He criticized the Biden administration's decision to take it out and said the move would have consequences. /jlne.ws/40V2wLF
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Regulation & Enforcement | Stories about regulation and the law. | India discussing crypto, regulation with G20, says finance minister Pradipta Mukherjee - Forkast As India moves forward with its one-year presidency of the Group of 20 (G20), it is discussing cryptocurrency and regulation with the group's members, India's Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said. /jlne.ws/3Yzooum CFTC's Energy and Environmental Markets Advisory Committee to Meet February 28 CFTC CFTC Commissioner Summer K. Mersinger, sponsor of the Energy and Environmental Markets Advisory Committee (EEMAC), today announced the EEMAC will hold a public meeting from 10:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. (CT) on Tuesday, February 28 in Nashville, Tennessee at the Nashville Public Library. Members of the public may also attend the meeting virtually and if space permits, in person. /jlne.ws/3I4IHsu CFTC Open Commission Meeting Cancelled for February 15 CFTC The Commodity Futures Trading Commission Open Meeting scheduled for Wednesday, February 15, 2023 has been cancelled. The matters under consideration are being handled through the Commission's seriatim process. /jlne.ws/3lCEpBi Statement of Commissioner Kristin N. Johnson Regarding CFTC Action Against Retail Forex Ponzi Scheme Targeting Spanish Speakers in Puerto Rico and the Continental United States CFTC The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) last Friday filed a complaint against FX Latino Inc. (FXL), Ramon Salvador Delgado-Gomez (Gomez), FXL Investment PR LLC, JRH Services Inc., Walmy Rivera-Santiago, Infinity Investment and Construction Management Corp., and Hector Javier Santos-Pagan (collectively, Defendants), in the U.S. District Court for the District of Puerto Rico. The Defendants allegedly launched advertisements on social media platforms such as Instagram and promoted public seminar and investor coaching campaigns to entice more than two thousand investors to invest at least $27 million. To attract investors, Defendants promised to generate profits through their successful foreign currency ("forex") trading platform. Similar to any number of "get-rich-quick" schemes promising exceptional returns while, in fact, perpetuating financial fraud, Defendants never actually engaged in trading or generated any profits. /jlne.ws/3ltgOCS SEC Proposes Revision to Privacy Act Rule SEC The Securities and Exchange Commission today proposed a rule that would revise the Commission's regulations under the Privacy Act. The Privacy Act is the principal law governing the handling of personal information in the federal government. The current rules provide procedures for making Privacy Act requests, including requests for access to and amendment of records pertaining to the individual making the request. The revisions will clarify, update, and streamline the language of several procedural provisions. /jlne.ws/3E7ZsC9 SEC Charges Former CEO of Slync in $67 Million Offering Fraud SEC The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged Christopher S. Kirchner, the co-founder and former CEO of Slync, Inc., a privately-held Texas-based software company, with fraudulently offering and selling more than $67 million of securities to multiple investors, more than $28 million of which he misappropriated for personal benefit. /jlne.ws/3RXQrBn Cicely LaMothe Named Deputy Director, Disclosure Operations, for the Division of Corporation Finance SEC The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced that Cicely LaMothe was named Deputy Director, Disclosure Operations, for the Division of Corporation Finance, effective Feb. 12, 2023. Ms. LaMothe served as the Acting Deputy Director for Disclosure Operations since August 2022. /jlne.ws/3S4Gd1Z Accounting Standard Setting in a Rapidly Evolving Business Environment: A Focus on the Timely Delivery of Investor Priorities SEC One year ago, we issued a statement stressing the importance of the Financial Accounting Foundation ("FAF") and Financial Accounting Standards Board's ("FASB") efforts to improve accounting standards and the standard-setting process,[2] including the vital investor[3] outreach performed through the FASB's 2021 Agenda Consultation.[4] Since then, the FASB's technical and research agendas were reprioritized, largely to focus on investor and other stakeholder priorities identified through the agenda consultation process. Recently, the FASB has made progress on many reprioritized projects, such as disaggregation of income statement expenses; accounting for and disclosure of crypto assets; improvements, including further disaggregation, to income tax disclosures; and segment reporting. Completion of these and other reprioritized projects in a timely manner is critical to the quality of accounting standards and the resulting quality of financial reporting. /jlne.ws/3YSI645 SEC Sues Texas Company and Two Executives to Halt $34 Million Scheme SEC The Securities and Exchange Commission announced that on January 6, 2023, it filed an emergency action in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, alleging that Clyde Cameron Cravey and Kenneth Wiedrich, through two entities they controlled, Reliable One Resources, Inc. and Quantum Filtration, Inc., were actively engaged in a fraudulent, unregistered offering that had raised approximately $34 million from over 500 investors. On January 9, 2023, the Court issued orders temporarily restraining the defendants' ongoing offering, temporarily freezing the defendants' assets, appointing a temporary receiver, and granting other emergency relief. /jlne.ws/3I2b76L SEC Charges Former CEO of Slync in $67 Million Offering Fraud SEC The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged Christopher S. Kirchner, the co-founder and former CEO of Slync, Inc., a privately-held Texas-based software company, with fraudulently offering and selling more than $67 million of securities to multiple investors, more than $28 million of which he misappropriated for personal benefit. /jlne.ws/3YNpfrL SEC to Make It Harder for Hedge Funds to Work With Crypto Firms: Bloomberg Parikshit Mishra - CoinDesk The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is planning to propose rule changes that would make it harder for hedge funds, private equity firms and pension funds to work with crypto firms, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. The SEC would make it harder for crypto firms to be "qualified custodians" or companies that hold client assets for money managers, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter. /jlne.ws/3E8Mnsk FMA finalises regulatory return questionnaire for licensed Financial Advice Providers Financial Market Authority Following consultation on the proposed standard licence conditions for all classes of Financial Advice Providers (FAPs), the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) - Te Mana TÄtai Hokohoko - today confirmed the information FAPs must provide in their regulatory returns. This information will set the focus for FMA's risk-based monitoring approach and is necessary to effectively supervise full FAP licence holders, in line with licence Standard Condition 3. /jlne.ws/3YwcUrL Co-Chairs of the Joint Regulatory Oversight Committee welcome the Strategic Working Group report FCA The FCA, as co-chair of the Joint Regulatory Oversight Committee (the committee), a cross-authority taskforce responsible for, among other things, thinking about the future vision and governance of open banking, welcomes the Strategic Working Group (SWG) report published today. /jlne.ws/3xphLPC New Zealand Financial Markets Authority Issues Interim Stop Order To Validus And Its Associated Persons Mondovisione The Financial Markets Authority (FMA) - Te Mana TÄtai Hokohoko - has today issued an Interim Stop Order (Order) to Validus International LLC (registered in Delaware, USA) pursuant to section 465 of the Financial Markets Conduct Act 2013 (the Act). While this Order is in force, Validus and its associated persons are prohibited from: making offers, issues, sales or other acquisitions or disposals of financial products promoted under the brand or name Validus; and accepting applications for financial products promoted under the brand or name Validus; /jlne.ws/3lAO4Z2
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Investing & Trading | Today's top stories from equities, indices and FICC (fixed income, currencies and commodities) | Exclusive: Pilot Company trims energy trading unit following Buffett takeover Laura Sanicola and Arathy Somasekhar - Reuters U.S. fuel retailer Pilot Company is trimming its energy trading operation, following the acquisition of a majority stake in the firm by investor Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Known for its Pilot Flying J service stations and truck stops, Knoxville, Tennessee-based Pilot expanded a fuel purchase and trading business in recent years by recruiting experienced diesel, gasoline and crude oil traders from Exxon Mobil Corp, Phillips 66 , Noble Group and others. /jlne.ws/3lArnnY Wall Street Games Out a 'No Landing' in Era of Stock Turbulence; Equities swerve as hot inflation reading confounds strategists; Markets pricing more rate hikes along with resilient economy Eva Szalay and Denitsa Tsekova - Bloomberg Renewed pressure on the Federal Reserve to intensify its inflation battle in the grip of a still-resilient economy is forcing Wall Street pros to rethink the stock-trading landscape. After a worrisome report on consumer prices landed Tuesday, bond investors amped up expectations that interest rates will move past 5% and stay there. The two-year Treasury yield surged anew, with bets on rate cuts later this year all but vanishing - a turnaround from dovish wagers placed just weeks ago. /jlne.ws/3lGPtx2 Transcript: Fabio Natalucci on How to Think About Financial Risk Right Now; Liquidity, leverage and interconnectedness? Tracy Alloway and Joe Weisenthal - Bloomberg The Federal Reserve raised interest rates at the fastest pace in decades in 2022. But despite the rapid shift in borrowing costs, not much in the financial system actually 'broke.' Stocks and other risk assets went down, but aside from a few issues like the gilt market drama in October, we didn't see a big systemic event. On this episode of Odd Lots, which was recorded live at the Credit Market Structure Alliance conference in New York, we speak with Fabio Natalucci about how he's thinking of financial risk right now. /jlne.ws/3YAFbgS British Columbia's Investment Manager Piles Into Private Credit Layan Odeh - Bloomberg British Columbia Investment Management Corp. deployed a record amount of cash in private credit last year after banks pulled back from lending. The investment manager had C$8.4 billion ($6.3 billion) in private debt as of March 31, the most since it first began investing in the asset class five years ago, its head of public markets, Daniel Garant, said in an interview. /jlne.ws/3I3kZwO Glencore Pays Out $7.1 Billion as Coal Drives Record Profit; Core profit surged 60% to record $34.1 billion last year; Glencore has continued mining coal even as rivals withdrew Thomas Biesheuvel - Bloomberg Glencore Plc will return more than $7 billion to shareholders in dividends and buybacks after the commodities giant reported another blockbuster profit driven by its coal and trading divisions. While Glencore and its rivals have been positioning themselves to take advantage of rising demand for metals linked to the energy transition - such as copper for wiring and nickel for batteries - the commodity giant's profits last year were overwhelmingly driven by mining and trading fossil fuels. /jlne.ws/3YQcr39 How an Emerging Markets Bull Raked In $40 Billion - Then Lost It; Ashmore came close to managing $100 billion in 2019, but outflows and poor performance have since eroded assets. Loukia Gyftopoulou - Bloomberg Back in the good times, Mark Coombs and his team of emerging markets bulls charmed the room with their charismatic storytelling and assertive style. From London to New York to Tokyo, clients admired their expertise and gave them billions to invest in some of the world's least-understood economies. /jlne.ws/3YyByba
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Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance | Stories about environmental, social and governance investing | Electric car enthusiasts tantalized by new idea: converting old vehicles; While a boutique industry around converting vintage cars to electric is growing, it's an exclusive, cost-prohibitive one Patrick George - The Guardian Over the next decade, millions of new battery-electric trucks, SUVs and cars are forecast to hit the market globally. In the US alone, Joe Biden is pushing for 50% of all new cars sold in 2030 to be zero-emission vehicles. What happens to all of the old gasoline- and diesel-powered cars that are on the road right now is trickier. One idea that's recently been in the spotlight is converting them to electric vehicles. Toyota made waves when it showcased two vintage Corollas that had been converted to electric and hydrogen power at a recent industry event where the company's CEO, Akio Toyoda, raised the prospect of the company getting into the conversion game. /jlne.ws/3RXZJNH Revealed: Mississippi bill would create 80% white judicial district in majority-Black city; Republican-proposed jurisdiction fuels allegations of 'apartheid in Jackson' Oliver Laughland, Sam Levine and Andrew Witherspoon - The Guardian Eighty per cent of the white residents in Mississippi's majority-Black capital city would be included in a proposed new judicial district with hand-selected prosecutors and judges, an analysis by the Guardian has found, leading to further allegations of deliberate racial prejudice in a Republican-backed bill. The measure would increase the geographic size of an improvement district in the downtown area of the city of Jackson from 7.8 square miles to 25 square miles. It would create a new unelected judicial district within the city, with two judges, two prosecutors and two public defenders. /jlne.ws/3XweYPc New Ideas, Better Teamwork in Pursuit of Paris Goals Gill Wadsworth - ESG Investor Buffeted by critics on both sides, finance sector alliances may need to refresh their tactics to progress toward net zero goals in 2023. This time last year BP was in receipt of numerous plaudits for accelerating its net zero transition plans. Among those singing the oil and gas giant's praises was Climate Action 100+ (CA100+), which acknowledged the work of its members in engaging with BP to secure promises to its operational emissions by 50% by 2030, compared with an aim of 30-35% previously. /jlne.ws/3xofJ21 Morgan Stanley Doubles Down on ESG Despite the Politics; The firm is offering a slew of new financial products in the face of Republican politicization of the investment strategy. Tim Quinson - Bloomberg Morgan Stanley has picked an interesting moment to press ahead with expanding its offering of ESG-themed funds. More from Bloomberg Green Al Gore's Struggles With ESG Show the Messiness of Green Investing Tesla to Open Up a Portion of Its Charging Network to All EVs To Go Climate-Positive, Ikea Needs to Fix Its Furniture Glue How to Power a Plane With Leftover Chinese Hot Pot Earlier this month, the New York-based investment bank introduced six ESG products. The equity and fixed-income exchange-traded funds are managed by Calvert Research and Management, a leader in environmental, social and governance investing that Morgan Stanley acquired in 2021 as part of its purchase of Eaton Vance Corp. /jlne.ws/3Yyz4t8 1 big thing: Ice sheets' long memory Axios Two new developments underscored the urgency of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, Andrew writes. Driving the news: The first was a new study published yesterday on global sea level rise. Along with extreme weather events, sea level rise is a climate change impact that is already affecting communities worldwide. In the U.S., this comes in the form of sunny day or nuisance flooding during astronomical high tides, as well as greater coastal flooding during storm events. /jlne.ws/3Sg8lzz Woe Canada! Energy Outlook Sours as Natural Gas Prices Collapse; Canadian oil earnings to decline more on par with US; S&P/TSX Energy Index has underperformed US, global indexes Geoffrey Morgan - Bloomberg From Wall Street to Toronto's Bay Street, analysts are slashing the outlooks for companies in one corner of the global oil patch that was expected to resist a sharp, double-digit earnings downturn: Canada. Analysts have aggressively cut their earnings forecasts for the nation's energy sector as reporting season accelerates in Toronto this week, with oil-sands giant Suncor Energy Inc. due to report fourth-quarter results Tuesday. /jlne.ws/3ImLgaX The incredible shrinking world of sustainability communications; Is it any wonder few sustainability stories ever see the light of day? Joel Makower - GreenBiz It's a weird moment in sustainable business. The corporate activity, the money flows, and the pressure from consumers, investors and regulators to take more proactive measures - all are ramping up. The mainstream media interest in corporate sustainability and climate tech is rising, too, a reflection of the perceived importance of companies' efforts to minimize their negative impacts and, in a small but growing number of cases, increase their positive impacts on people and the planet. It's a heady time for those of us who have been toiling in these fields for years or decades, often far from the limelight. So, why do company communications on these efforts seem so feeble and - OK, I'll just say it - incompetent? /jlne.ws/3IqACQn ESG Growing Pains Tom Abrams - Tabbforum Key issues - colorfully referred to as growing pains - from the recent CFA Society "ESG Now and Beyond" conference are presented here. Tom Abrams, Associate Director for deep sector content at FactSet, goes over the main points in detail. This FactSet Insight shares our notes from a Jan. 25 CFA Society New York conference on sustainable investing titled "ESG Now and Beyond." (agenda here) Our overall take from the presentations is that organizations and governments are truly wrestling with several meaningful issues raised in achieving ESG goals. Those issues were colorfully referred to as growing pains. Some of the key points we noted. /jlne.ws/3YVYK2V TNFD Momentum Gathers After COP15; Final beta version to follow on heels of agreement on Target 15 in new Global Biodiversity Framework. Jack Grogan-Fenn - ESG Investor Following the adoption of the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) at Montreal's COP15, the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) said the release of its V0.4 beta framework in March would further assist firms in assessing and reporting on biodiversity and nature-related risks. /jlne.ws/3E5AzHm Ford just exposed the biggest lie of net zero Ben Marlow - The Telegraph Now is not a good time to be working in Britain's car industry. Nobody said the shift to electric vehicles was going to be smooth, but the true scale of the disruption is only just starting to be understood. The level of reinvention required on the path to decarbonisation is almost akin to starting again. Entire business models that have existed for decades are being torn up, factories mothballed, and car line-ups dramatically scaled back. /jlne.ws/3jZFYc1 Handle With Care: The Role of Third-Party ESG Ratings Providers in the Fund Selection Process TabbForum While ratings can be a helpful tool to identify and understand potential ESG risks and opportunities, MFS believe they should be just one of several tools used to implement ESG investing. As ESG investing continues to grow in assets and popularity, advisors can play an important role in helping clients understand what a rating captures, as well as what it might be missing. It is crucial for advisors to develop their own processes for evaluating investment managers' approaches to ESG investing, which can include third-party ratings. /jlne.ws/3jWR55z Green Finance Gets Messy in a World Where Oil Makes Big Profits; The European Investment Bank's loan to Repsol for building an advanced biofuels plant has raised some concerns. John Ainger and Akshat Rathi - Bloomberg The world is not investing enough to meet climate goals. The estimates vary on the exact sum, but the gap is on the order of trillions of dollars annually. Meeting that will need all kinds of financial institutions to step up. One of the institutions helping fill that hole is the European Investment Bank, which was created in 1958 to fund infrastructure projects but has since morphed into one of the biggest backers of green finance. More than half the money that it lends today is for climate and environment, with a goal to support EUR1 trillion ($1.1 trillion) in green investments by 2030 crucial for the European Union to meet its climate goals. /jlne.ws/40XZKoL Al Gore's Struggles With ESG Show the Messiness of Green Investing; If the former veep's Generation investment firm has trouble meeting lofty environmental and financial goals, who can? Saijel Kishan and Noah Buhayar - Bloomberg Few have done more than Al Gore to galvanize public opinion on climate change. The former US vice president's documentary An Inconvenient Truth won an Oscar. He shared the Nobel Peace Prize for work on climate change. And he's trained tens of thousands of activists to raise awareness about the threat of a warming planet. Addressing the plutocrats gathered in Davos, Switzerland, last year, Gore thundered with the fervor of a Baptist preacher: "Who cares if our children and grandchildren curse us and ask, 'What in God's name were you thinking? You had the ability to stop this hell on Earth!'" /jlne.ws/3XvYbLZ
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Banks, Brokers & Managed Funds | The latest from banks, brokers, hedge funds and managed futures | Vanguard to Liquidate a Mutual Fund for First Time Since 2020 Katie Greifeld - Bloomberg Asset manager Vanguard Group plans to shutter a US mutual fund for the first time since the throes of the pandemic. The $98 million Vanguard Alternative Strategies Fund (ticker VASFX) will be liquidated in the second quarter of 2023, according to a press release Tuesday. The fund, which launched in 2015, "has not gained broad acceptance among investors," Vanguard said. /jlne.ws/3lsGGPg BIS: Constrained Liquidity Provision In Currency Markets Date; BIS Working Papers Mondovisione The paper focuses on the role of financial intermediaries in supporting the functioning of the foreign exchange (FX) market. We argue that the capacity of intermediaries to provide liquidity is tied to their ability to absorb risk, which affects the cost of liquidity provision and the FX market's overall functioning. We examine two key questions: (i) do intermediaries' constraints increase the cost of market liquidity, and (ii) does liquidity provision become less elastic when constraints on intermediaries tighten? /jlne.ws/3K4U0Up EBA Publishes Final Draft Technical Standards Defining The Homogeneity Of The Underlying Exposures In STS Securitisation Mondovisione The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today its final draft Regulatory Technical Standards (RTS) setting out the conditions for the assessment of the homogeneity of the underlying exposures in a pool of a Simple Transparent and Standardised (STS) on-balance-sheet securitisation. Homogeneity is one of the key simplicity requirements enabling originators and investors to properly assess the underlying risks while facilitating investors due diligence. /jlne.ws/3jROcmE Barclays Profit Falls as Deal Making Declines; Shares Drop; Bank disappointed investors by missing forecasts for a key measure of profit and giving an underwhelming outlook for the year ahead Josh Mitchell - The Wall Street Journal Barclays PLC's profit fell in the fourth quarter from a year earlier, as a downturn in deal making and raising funds for corporate clients held back its investment bank.m The British banking giant disappointed investors by missing forecasts for a key measure of profit and giving an underwhelming outlook for the year ahead, helping send its shares sharply lower. /jlne.ws/3YMxDHe Commerzbank to Resume Shareholder Payouts After Long Hiatus Steven Arons - Bloomberg Commerzbank AG is planning to pay a dividend and buy back shares as it joins European peers in rewarding investors after a long hiatus in payouts. The German lender is proposing a dividend of EUR0.20 ($0.21) per share on last year's profit, according to a statement Wednesday. It has also asked the European Central Bank and the German Finance Agency, which manages the stake in the lender that's still held by the government, for approval of a buyback plan to meet a target of paying out 30% of last year's profit. /jlne.ws/3jSlP7T Credit Suisse Pays Double to Lure Investors to Its Bond Offering; Lender's London branch is paying up for euro debt offering; Sale comes after bank reported fifth-straight quarterly loss Priscila Azevedo Rocha and Paul Cohen - Bloomberg Credit Suisse Group AG is offering investors a hefty incentive to buy its new euro bonds just days after announcing a bigger-than-expected quarterly loss. The Swiss lender's London branch, which is selling a three-and-a-half year note, is offering more than double the average spread that its peers paid for similar deals this year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The embattled bank also offered chunky premiums for sales in other currencies last month. /jlne.ws/3YNtJyB Deutsche Bank cuts ties with Selfridges co-owner René Benko; Developer named by prosecutors last year as a suspect in long-running corruption investigation Sam Jones, Stephen Morris and Olaf Storbeck - Financial Times Deutsche Bank has cut ties to one of Europe's most successful property developers over concerns about his involvement in a sprawling corruption investigation. Germany's biggest lender decided late last year to end its business relationship with René Benko, the Austrian real estate billionaire who co-owns Selfridges in London, the Chrysler Building in New York and German department store, KaDeWe, according to three people with close knowledge of Benko's financial affairs. /jlne.ws/3K5JmNf
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Work & Management | Stories impacting work and more about management ideas, practices and trends. | Getting a GreenFin(ance) Job Nico McCrossan - GreenFinWeekly A year ago this week, as a grad student, I arrived at GreenBiz 22 to check in for my first shift as a conference volunteer. Today, at GreenBiz 23, I'm arriving as a member of GreenBiz Group. Specifically, as an analyst with the GreenFin team, working with Grant Harrison, director and senior analyst for finance and ESG. So, I want to help answer a question on the minds of many aspiring sustainability professionals: How did I get this job? /jlne.ws/3EaNoQC Sledgehammer of big fines looms over EU worker consultation; Proposals in Brussels seek to introduce penalties in line with those for GDPR breaches Peggy Hollinger - Financial Times European business leaders often talk about the need for good labour relations. But you just have to look around Europe right now to realise that things are not quite going to plan. Since the start of 2023, there have been strikes about pay, pensions reform, and the cost of living in France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Spain, the UK and beyond. /jlne.ws/3k2vF7a
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Wellness Exchange | An Exchange of Health and Wellness Information | Zantac's Maker Kept Quiet About Cancer Risks for 40 Years; Glaxo says the heartburn drug doesn't cause tumors. But the company was warned by its own scientists and independent researchers about the potential danger. Anna Edney, Susan Berfield and Jef Feeley - Bloomberg The small British company was sometimes called Glaxo University, because it conducted important pharmaceutical research that rarely resulted in profitable drugs. Then the scientists at Glaxo Laboratories created a molecule they called ranitidine, and in 1978 the company was granted a US patent. The molecule was new, but not novel. The scientists had, as scientists sometimes do, looked for a way to mimic the success of an established drug-in this case, one that healed ulcers and could be used to treat heartburn. They developed ranitidine quickly, and the US Food and Drug Administration reviewed it quickly. Glaxo gave it the brand name Zantac. /jlne.ws/3lEdKnL The truth about caffeine: how coffee really affects our bodies; Every day, around the world, 2bn cups are consumed. But what actually happens after you swallow that first mouthful? Here is everything you need to know Joel Snape - The Guardian Coffee. Go juice. Liquid gold. The one with all the psychoactive properties. Once used by Sufi mystics as an aid to concentration during religious rituals, it's now one of the most ubiquitous drinks on the planet: we get through about 2bn cups a day. It's also one of the most valued and pored-over drinks. One particularly sought-after blend, Black Ivory, which is produced by encouraging elephants to digest arabica berries, retails at more than £2,000 a kilogram, while coffee-making championships attract thousands of spectators. /jlne.ws/3YNCmbS
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Regions | Stories of local interest from the Americas, EMEA and Asia-Pacific regions | Oil Demand to Hit New Record This Year as China Reopens, IEA Says; After economic hibernation during the pandemic, the world is back on track to burn more crude than ever Will Horner - The Wall Street Journal The world will burn more oil than ever this year, the International Energy Agency forecast, as China's emergence from Covid-19 lockdowns returns global crude demand to its upward, prepandemic trajectory. The Paris-based energy watchdog said in a monthly report that it expects oil demand to grow to a record 101.9 million barrels a day this year, propelled almost entirely by booming demand in Asia. The figure is 200,000 barrels a day more than the IEA was forecasting last month. That translates into some two million barrels a day of annual growth this year. Asian nations will account for 1.4 million barrels a day of that, and China alone will account for 900,000 barrels a day, the IEA said. /jlne.ws/3I1cfY3 Turkish Support for Stocks Sparks $1 Billion Buyback Scramble Ugur Yilmaz - Bloomberg Turkish companies are rushing to repurchase their own shares after regulators ditched a 15% withholding tax on buybacks in a bid to support the stock market in the aftermath of two devastating earthquakes. At least 52 companies have announced new buyback programs or increased the amount they'd already allocated to spend on buying their stock. So far they've earmarked 21.3 billion liras ($1.13 billion) for buybacks since the twin quakes caused widespread destruction in Turkey and Syria last week. /jlne.ws/3S0S9Ss Rio de Janeiro's Picturesque Bay Is a Toxic Ship Graveyard Andrew Rosati - Bloomberg Framed by green mountains and a sweeping cityscape, Guanabara Bay offers one of Rio de Janeiro's most breathtaking views. This triangle of water inland from the Atlantic Ocean, which separates Rio from the city of Niterói, has enchanted countless visitors to Brazil and inspired pop stars to song. They might not want to sing about it today. /jlne.ws/3XC9eTU Brookfield Defaults on Two Los Angeles Office Towers; Properties include the Gas Company Tower and the 777 Tower; Brookfield DTLA Fund had warned it may face foreclosures John Gittelsohn - Bloomberg Brookfield Corp., parent of the largest office landlord in downtown Los Angeles, is defaulting on loans tied to two buildings rather than refinancing the debt as demand for space weakens in the center of the second-largest US city. The two properties in default, part of a portfolio called Brookfield DTLA Fund Office Trust Investor, are the Gas Company Tower, with $465 million in loans, and the 777 Tower, with about $290 million in debt, according to a filing. The fund manager had warned in November that it may face foreclosure on properties. /jlne.ws/3Xtp03n Americans Are Tying the Knot Again After Pandemic Pause Alexandre Tanzi - Bloomberg The number of US marriages bounced back in 2021 from a 57-year-low the year before during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. Marriages rose 18% to 1.98 million in 2021, according to a blog post by the National Center for Health Statistics. Both the number and rate of marriage remained below their 2019 levels, however. At 6 marriages per 1,000 people, the 2021 ratio was the second-lowest in data going back to 1900. /jlne.ws/3S0ccjW US Ag Chief Vilsack 'Disappointed' in Mexico GMO Corn Decree; Rebuffs Mexico president's concession on simmering trade fight; AMLO still plans to move forward with ban on human consumption Eric Martin and Mike Dorning - Bloomberg US Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack rebuffed a concession by Mexico in a simmering trade dispute over a planned ban on genetically modified US corn. Vilsack is "disappointed" by Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador's decree that would scale back the planned ban by scrapping a deadline to halt imports of GMO corn for livestock feed, according to a statement Tuesday. The Mexican president known as AMLO is still pressing forward with a prohibition on GMO corn for human consumption. /jlne.ws/3xppddu
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