Wing Hang Bank, a Hong Kong-listed bank, has signed a deal with Misys, the global application software and services company, to install an advanced treasury and capital markets software application in the banks Hong Kong head office and its subsidiary banks operation in China.
As part of a strategic focus on meeting customer demand for structured products, the bank will implement Misys Summit FT, a best of breed treasury and capital markets software platform, offering cross-asset trading, risk and straight-through processing (STP) for vanilla to complex structured trades.
The software platform incorporates an award-winning structured products module – MUST (Multi-Underlying Structured Trade) tools and will enable the bank to operate all asset classes on a common platform in the future. Structured products are becoming popular in the Hong Kong market and the bank is expecting improved operational efficiency as trades will be processed by front and back offices in a matter of minutes.
“Our goal is full STP and the installation of Misys Summit FT means our front, middle and back office treasury departments will benefit across all product types including fixed income, money markets, structured products and derivatives. This deal will help us both streamline operations and achieve a faster time to market for new products,” says Frank Wang, deputy CEO, Wing Hang Bank, Hong Kong.
There is substantial growth in the treasury and capital markets sector in Asia mainly driven by deregulation in mainland China and the birth of its own RMB derivatives market. In Hong Kong, the extremely low interest rate environment has also driven banks and fund houses to innovate in structured products to compete on this, rather than in vanilla yields.
“Hong Kong is, without a doubt, Asias leading innovator in structuring these complex products and our software solutions will help Wing Hang bank capitalise on these growth opportunities. We have a 100% successful implementation track record, with 15 customers already using our structured products and derivatives solution in the Greater China region, and I believe we have proven to Wing Hang Bank that we hold the best software solutions, best financial engineers, and best implementation consultants in the market,” says Sunny Leung, head of Sales, Greater China Region, Misys Solution for Treasury & Capital Markets.
The bank chose to install Summit FT after evaluating a number of other competitor offerings, including Reuters, Murex and Sophis. Phase one installation is due to commence in March 2008 and scheduled to go live by year end.