CEO Letter - August 2019

By: , Aug 2019

Dear Colleagues,

Welcome to the August issue of Focus, a truly bumper edition as we look back to the WFE Technology Conference 2019, which took place at the beginning of July, in Umeå, Sweden, with partner Umeå University.

We spent more than two days dissecting how our industry can work with, and benefit from, emerging technologies. These opportunities present us with a new and sometimes daunting set of challenges as we embrace and embed technology into our organisations. The world of technology is moving fast, and there is an ever-growing list of new and exciting technological innovations which we need to harness to keep our sector protected yet competitive.

We are delighted to welcome many of our speakers from the Technology Conference to this issue of Focus. Contributors include:

  • Simon Zammit, Chief Executive Officer, Malta Stock Exchange on DLT and blockchain in Malta;
  • Mark Morrison, Senior Vice President and Chief Security Officer, The Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) discussing cyber security challenges with emerging technologies in financial services;
  • Brad Peterson, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology and Chief Information Officer, Nasdaq on embracing technology to shape the capital markets of the future;
  • Dan Chesterman, Chief Information Officer, Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) on how the firm is using Distributed Ledger Technology in practice;
  • Shiv Kumar Bhasin, Chief Technology and Operations Officer, National Stock Exchange of India Limited (NSE),who tackles the issues of new cyber frontiers in new markets;
  • Virginia Dignum, Professor of Social and Ethical Artificial Intelligence, Umeå University, who shares her thoughts on how humans are responsible for the impact AI will have on society and individuals;
  • Laura Navaratnam, Manager, Innovation Hub, Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), who discusses the role of innovation, and diversity, in regulation;
  • Dean Bruce Weber, Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics, University of Delaware who explores the technological future for exchanges and CCPs; and
  • Tomas Blomquist, Professor in Business Administration, Umeå School of Business, Economics and Statistics, who gives his perspectives on the WFE's Technology Conference.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of our speakers and panellists, and our ever-patient and gracious hosts, Umeå University, who showed us the very best of Swedish hospitality in their incredible city and surrounding countryside. As I said in my closing remarks at the conference, there is no better way to get to know your industry colleagues than cooking moose on an open BBQ!

This month, we are delighted to welcome Jiwon Jung, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Korea Exchange, who sat down with us to share his vision for KRX, talks about the work the exchange is doing in the ESG space, and looks ahead to hosting the AOSEF General Assembly in 2020.

June 2019 marked a key milestone in China-Japan collaboration, as the Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) and Japan Exchange Group (JPX) held ceremonies to officially launch China-Japan ETF Connectivity, a scheme for creating ETFs that link the ETF markets of the two bourses, while increasing opportunities for cross-border investments between China and Japan. Lisa Yingying Li, Head, Overseas Institutional Investor Services, Global Business Development, Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) tells us more about this initiative.

Santiago Exchange has launched its new brand look and feel, which reinforces its strategy and corporate values, as a technological, innovative, transparent, reliable and sustainable company.

I had the pleasure of being a judge for Singapore Exchange’s second edition of the SGX Orb Awards, which seeks to recognise excellence in financial news and content. Open to all local and overseas producers of content that demonstrate relevance to Singapore as a financial hub, the awards attracted more than 120 entries from international media and national newspapers as well as independent writers. The winners were announced on 21 August 2019, and we feature a summary of the awards ceremony in the magazine.

This year, IOSCO and the WFE are working in partnership on a new initiative to support World Investor Week (WIW) called ‘Ring the Bell for Financial Literacy’. We invite WFE members to hold a bell ringing ceremony or a workshop during WIW 2019 (30 September to 4 October), to promote the importance of financial literacy, and to raise awareness of WIW 2019. We already have more than 30 members taking part, and would be so pleased to get this number even higher in the coming weeks.

We learn from Olumide Orojimi, Head, Corporate Communications, The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) about the NSE Corporate Challenge, a 5km walk, jog, and run to raise awareness about the early detection, screening and treatment of cancer.

And finally, we would like to wish Tunis Stock Exchange a very happy 50thanniversary! We hear from Lofti Khezami, Chief Communication Officer of Tunis Stock Exchange about the most important milestones in the exchange’s history.

July and August have been very busy months for the WFE’s Regulatory Affairs team. The WFE wrote a letter to the European Commission and the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), setting out principles that could avoid international regulatory dissonance in the cross-border supervision of central counterparties (CCPs), as the EU sets about adopting rules to implement EMIR 2.2; a position paper on the importance of valuing stock market data correctly;a response to IOSCO's Consultation on Crypto-Asset Trading Platforms; and a response to the CPMI-IOSCO paper on CCP default management auctions.

The WFE Research team published a white paper on sustainability and commodity derivativesexploring sustainability in the context of commodity derivatives markets. The paper is intended to stimulate discussion amongst the WFE membership and the wider commodity derivatives industry about how they might respond to the potential impact of sustainability issues on commodity markets. The WFE Statistics team’s monthly insights piece summarises market highlights from H1 2019, alongside our latest monthly dashboard and market statistics data.

Registration is filling up fast for the 59th General Assembly & Annual Meeting (Singapore, 8-10 October 2019). We will soon be at capacity for some elements of the conference, so please do sign up soon to guarantee your place. The agenda is already looking really exciting, with some incredible speakers lined up from many of our member exchanges and CCPs, and industry organisations including the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), BlackRock and GIC.

With that counting for our summer holidays, we wish you all a good return to work for the Autumn!