AIM Software has launched its 5th international reference data management survey. AIM Software’s study is designed to provide insight into the trends, challenges and planned investments for reference data automation and risk management. The survey is carried out by AIM Software in collaboration with FISD and is sponsored by Interactive Data (Europe) Ltd.
In recent years, few areas of operations have attracted as much interest as reference data management and risk management. But how successful have financial institutions actually been in improving automation levels within their companies? What are the driving forces for reference data automation? How well can the financial industry cope with new regulations, such as MiFID? And how mature are back office systems in those areas?
In order to find answers to these questions, AIM Software regularly undertakes research in more than 70 countries. This year’s edition of the survey will examine changes and advances between 2008 and previous years. .
“The positive feedback from financial institutions, global media and thewhole financial industry encouraged us to continue our research and led us to conducting the survey for the fifth consecutive year,” says Martin Buchberger, head of marketing at AIM Software. “We saw that the impact of new regulations is about to substantially change the whole operational infrastructure of financial institutions. We specifically took a closer look at risk management and reference data management processes in order to get a better picture of what shapes this development and to see how companies cope with it.”
The 2008 survey intends to observe how regulations and market liberalization influence the global financial markets. The final results of the AIM Global Data and Risk Management Survey 2008 will be available by the end of 2008. Participants benefit from a free, comprehensive benchmarking to the rest of the market, country-specific drill-downs and charts.
“This year’s survey again tries to distinguish which issues signify a trend and which are hype,” Buchberger says. “The results from last year’s survey proved that this research spotted most of the developments on a long-term scale before they became crucial, giving readers the chance to see where they stand in their own efforts.”
Last year’s findings at a glance:
– The 2007 survey results show that financial institutions all over the world are undertaking considerable efforts to deepen and to further automate their reference data management, with the percentage of companies planning to increase automation growing by 15 percentage points (2006: 28% in / 2007: 43%).
– 49% declare that MiFID has a substantial influence on IT investments (Basel II: 60%, Sarbanes-Oxley: 27%).
– Although a relatively high percentage of 39% of the interviewed companies still rely on proprietary development, 40% of them claimed in 2007 to prefer buying a solution and/or to extend it, compared to some 22% in 2006.
– 43% of the respondents plan to increase the degree of automation for reference data and 29% for pricing data. 33% of the more than 400 respondents plan to increase their level of automation in corporate actions.
– 54% of the interviewed financial institutions plan to extend their reference data management facilities within the next two years, whereas in 2006 only 37% of companies planned to do so.