Marion Leslie is the managing director of pricing & reference services as well as enterprise risk management at Thomson Reuters.
What were the major themes for your business in 2015 as it related to your clients and the challenges they faced?
The major themes were and remain regulation, risk management and data management. The latter is a fundamental requirement for effective, efficient, and assured delivery against regulatory and risk management needs. The regulatory calendar ticked inexorably by, presenting challenges for firms with their understanding, approach to and implementation of BCBS 239 for risk data aggregation, BCBS 238 for liquidity coverage, Solvency II for the insurance industry, AIFMD for the fund industry, and the evolving requirements of MiFID II. The buy-side found itself front and centre of regulatory pressures that had been hitherto concentrated more on the sell-side, and firms found themselves having to address infrastructure and data management issues and understand the dynamics of previously outsourced processes in order to comply.
What are your expectations for 2016 as it relates to your clients and the challenges they will face?
Automation, data interoperability, and developing robust enterprise data management models will remain important in 2016. Newer technologies will enable the industry to reduce expenditures on legacy systems and outdated infrastructure models. We expect to see more firms accessing and investing in “FinTech” entities, managed services and utilities. There will be more collaboration and partnership across the industry as players seek to focus on their core business, but continue to deliver for the marketplace. There will be more convergence between risk, regulation, data management and technology driving greater efficiencies. Firms will begin to see benefits as by-products of managing their data more effectively – by freeing-up data assets hitherto trapped in siloed business lines, firms will be able to deliver better investment decisions, risk management, performance analysis and customer service.