FX trading is advancing towards front-to-back ecosystems

Key Takeaways

• Disparate systems pose operational and compliance risks
• New challenges accelerate the need for end-to-end integration
• Leveraging the latest tech helps future-proof FX trading operations

FX is the envy of other asset classes with its breadth and sheer volumes – the latest Bank for International Settlements (BIS) triennial report shows about USD 7.5 trillion exchanged daily.

These volumes come with a complex landscape, including diverse market participants and intricate workflows to cater to their business and regulatory requirements. This has led to the rise of niche technology providers automating specific parts of the trading workflow.

However, most of this automation has been in isolation, and firms still rely on disparate systems for their end-to-end FX requirements. This poses operational risks due to manual touchpoints and challenges in data analytics, decision-making, and regulatory compliance.

Disparate systems: A double-edged sword

FX market participants range from sell- and buy-side firms to corporates, central banks, and individual speculators. This has generated an expansive breadth of functionality and workflows, and it is common for firms to pick the “best-of-breed” systems from various providers.

While this approach offers specialized functionality, it creates data silos, inconsistent data models, and a lack of standardized interfaces for data flow. This increases operational risk as more manual intervention is required to reconcile data and resolve exceptions between systems, which is time-consuming and error-prone and leads to inaccurate trade reporting, settlement delays, and financial losses.

Managing systems by multiple providers also increases complexity and involves high costs. Firms must invest in multiple technologies, integration projects, and support services. Additionally, each product comes with different user experiences – not just the graphical interfaces but also user journeys and terminologies – which introduces a learning curve and requires further investments in training.

These challenges highlight the need to not just automate workflows but to integrate them across the trade lifecycle.

Evolving regulations expose compliance vulnerabilities

The steady stream of regulations, such as MiFID II, Dodd-Frank, and CFTC/EMIR Refit, aim to implement robust compliance so that firms can identify and report the risks associated with their engagement in the FX market. The FX Global Code (GFXC) was launched as a joint initiative to reduce settlement risk and increase standardization through principles for good practice.

These regulations impact workflows across the trade lifecycle, which has cast a spotlight on the disconnected nature of FX technology. Adhering to these requirements is particularly challenging as they require consistent, accurate, and real-time end-to-end data flow to avoid compliance breaches and hefty penalties. Therefore, integrated systems are crucial to ensure comprehensive regulatory compliance.

Similar regulatory changes in other asset classes, such as SA-CCR, uncleared margin rules, and the move to settle trades T+1, have been equally challenging. To date, a large chunk of the post-trade budget has been allocated to comply with industry, regulatory, and trade repository guidelines. This highlights operational inefficiencies and the need for integrated systems to maximize straight-through processing (STP) rates and ensure the integrity and consistency of data.

The need for front-to-back ecosystems

In a report by Refinitiv and the Greenwich Coalition, the availability of end-to-end workflows was the second most important criterion for firms to select an FX trading platform. This reinforces the need for FX technology providers to double down on front-to-back FX ecosystems rather than siloed workflows.

Currently, firms and technology providers suffer from the quadratic growth problem of connecting every system to every other system. However, a superficial connection of business workflows is not enough. Next-generation FX systems must adopt a true interoperability paradigm encompassing infrastructure, semantics, and data models. This will ensure computational, business-domain, and design language consistency, instead of a Frankenstein’s monster, that not only inhibits growth and scalability but exponentially increases the cost of maintaining the legacy systems.

Technological enablers

Firms rely on FX systems to support not only their business needs and the needs of their customers, but to provide stability through market turbulence and geopolitical tensions. However, as FX systems have become increasingly distributed, the complexity of monitoring them has increased exponentially.

Rich distributed systems need to be robust, scalable, and fault-tolerant. This requires a two-pronged approach.

Firstly, technology providers need to adopt cloud-native architecture. This will enable high availability, auto-scaling, fault tolerance, and automatic recovery to cater to clients’ evolving business needs and ensure operational continuity. Secondly, workflows need to be analyzed to identify chokepoints and add telemetry. This is required not only for real-time alerting but also to pre-empt failures and manage exceptions gracefully and automatically.

The path to transformation

While the benefits of front-to-back ecosystems are clear, the journey toward implementation can be challenging with high initial investment costs, change -complexities, and the need for specialized expertise. However, the long-term benefits in terms of efficiency, risk reduction, and cost savings far outweigh the initial investment.

For firms embarking on this transformation, the first step is to perform a comprehensive audit of their existing FX infrastructure. This is crucial to identify pain points that would benefit most from automation and integration. Collaboration with technology partners who specialize in building end-to-end solutions will also be instrumental in achieving this goal.

As the FX market continues to evolve, front-to-back ecosystems will play a pivotal role in shaping its future. By breaking down silos, streamlining processes, and leveraging advanced technologies, these integrated solutions will empower firms to navigate the complexities of the market with greater agility, efficiency, and resilience.

The transition to a connected world is underway. Embrace it and unlock the full potential of your FX trading operations.