SunGrad says its Front Capital Systems operating unit has released a new version of a system called Front Arena.
Front Arena aims to help banks evaluate profit and loss in terms of risk factor changes. SunGard says, “it provides answers to questions such as: `What proportion of total P&L is due to changes in time, interest rates and credit spreads?'” According to SunGard, this type of analysis provides traders and risk managers with immediate feedback about the factors driving their profits and is particularly useful for those trading structured products. The latest version (2.1) adds cross-asset class P&L functionality and exception-based processing for equities, credit derivatives, interest rate derivatives and fixed income. The new version also includes a settlement application designed to increase rates of automation.
“With the latest release of Front Arena we are delivering a cross-asset class system with greater depth and flexibility,” says Mats Lillienberg, chief technology officer at Front. “It’s a standard package that also lays the foundation for the migration to a service-oriented architecture and offers support for Linux. It will help our customers benefit both from the easy-to-use functional enhancements as well as the improved scalability and performance of their systems.”
Claudio Camplani, head of Global Treasury at BDG Lugano, says the new functionality of FRONT ARENA 2.1 enabled the firm to migrate in-house extensions to the core product. “By having more functionality in the core, performance has been enhanced,” he says. “Less reliance on extensions will help us to take on new releases faster as well as helping to lower the cost of system ownership.”