Difficult to understand, and even more difficult to process, much less in an automated STP fashion, corporate actions were too often seen as a boring and risky business.
Fortunately, a number of vendors have made dealing with corporate actions simpler. Spending on corporate actions has steadily increased in the last three years, rising from $121 million in 2004 to $285 million in 2007, with the largest portion of this allocated to integration and software applications. This is projected to climb steadily in the coming years, with more and more assets being allocated to the development and purchase of corporate actions software applications.
As firms seek to further reduce risk from corporate actions Aite Group expects to see more funding given to applications which are able to increase productivity and reduce risk.
“In the coming year, there will be major changes to the standards and best practices utilized in corporate actions and firms will have to ensure that their daily corporate actions process is up to snuff in order to be prepared for the coming changes. Having a corporate actions solution, which is properly installed and utilized, is a major first step in preparedness,” says Philip Silitschanu, senior analyst, Aite Group.
This 75-page Impact Report contains 19 Figures and 22 Tables, and profiles nine corporate actions applications vendors: Asset Control, CheckFree, Fidelity ActionsXchange, Information Mosaic, Infosys, MileStone Group, SmartStream, Tata Consultancy Services, and Xcitek Solutions Plus. It is the first in a two-part series on corporate actions.