ADIA’s Borgquist becomes GPFA’s head of international (ex-North America)
The Global Peer Financing Association (GPFA) continues to grow its membership of buy-side institutional investors across all global regions. To support this continued growth and development of member networking and education, GPFA announced that Amy Borgquist, Research and Portfolio Engineering lead at the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), will be the Association’s head of International (outside North America).
Amy will work closely with the GPFA Board of Directors to ensure GPFA activities are well coordinated globally to best serve the interests of beneficial owners in this Association. Being placed in the Middle East, Amy is well positioned to connect GPFA members across Europe, the Middle East & Africa, and Asia Pacific.
Clear Street adds 10 employees after React acquisition in futures push
Clear Street, a New York-based independent prime broker, announced that it intends to enter the futures clearing market with the acquisition of React Consulting Services and its proprietary, cloud-native futures clearing platform, BASIS. Financial details are not disclosed.
BASIS will be integrated into Clear Street’s existing cloud-native clearing, settlement, execution, and custody platform. Clear Street’s prime brokerage platform currently processes more than 2.5% of the gross notional US equities volume.
“Integrating BASIS will give our customers seamless access to futures alongside our equity, options, and fixed income offering in one platform,” said Sachin Kumar, co-founder and CTO at Clear Street, in a statement. “This acquisition accelerates our product development timeline and brings us closer to a single platform for every asset class, in every country, and in any currency.”
Clear Street will welcome 10 new employees from React, including co-founders Pat Mayo and Dave Evans, who will both join Clear Street as managing directors for Clear Street Technology. The 10 team members bring decades of experience in futures and will report directly to Kumar.
“The React team shares Clear Street’s vision for a unified prime brokerage platform and believes deeply in the Company’s mission to build modern financial infrastructure for today’s institutions,” said Mayo in a statement.
Upon the integration of BASIS, Clear Street will offer clients everything they need to clear, custody, and finance US equities, options, fixed income, and futures. Full integration of BASIS will be phased, as the company plans to connect the platform to futures exchanges starting in early 2024.
SFT: HQLAX hires Anand Paul as lead for client onboarding
HQLAX has appointed Anand Paul to lead the firm’s client onboarding team. Based in London, Paul will focus on partnering with clients to help them to onboard to the HQLAX platform as seamlessly as possible.
The new team lead will aid users in adopting the platform and to realise value — such as operational efficiencies — through the firm’s ecosystem. Paul joins HQLAX after a 10-year tenure at Credit Suisse, where he was primarily positioned within change and business management for two main departments including Global Markets and Compliance.
BNP Paribas’s Securities Services business appoints co-heads of Data & Digital Services department
BNP Paribas’s Securities Services business announced the appointment of Jean-Marc Friess and Thomas Durif as co-heads of its Data & Digital Services department, with immediate effect. In their respective roles, Jean-Marc and Thomas will drive Securities Services’ strategy for data and digital services, in line with BNP Paribas’s 2025 strategic plan – called GTS for Growth, Technology and Sustainability.
Jean-Marc Friess is appointed Chief Digital Services Officer for Securities Services. In his new role, Jean-Marc will continue to lead Securities Services’ digital channels and services roadmap and will take over the lead of its Cognitive Centre, including NOA, the bank’s recently launched AI-driven virtual assistant. Jean-Marc will also support Securities Services’ digital services plan to further position NeoLink as a top-tier client platform.
Thomas Durif is appointed Chief Data Officer for Securities Services. In his new role, Thomas will lead Securities Services’ corporate data strategy to efficiently deliver high-quality data and enhance the data governance framework. Thomas will be in charge of further developing Securities Services’ next-generation data infrastructure to support its omnichannel approach and data servicing value proposition.
Lydie Vallese, general secretary and head of Company Engagement for Securities Services at BNP Paribas, said in a statement: “Spearheading digitalization is a priority that shapes Securities Services’ development and innovation strategy. Jean-Marc and Thomas’s complementary and extensive expertise will be instrumental in providing our clients with superior data management and innovative data services.”
GLEIF appoints Dessa Glasser to chair of the Board and three new non-execs
The Global Legal Entity Identifier Foundation (GLEIF) Board has elected Dessa Glasser, principal of the Financial Risk Group, as the organization’s new chair. Glasser is an existing GLEIF Board member and chair of GLEIF’s Risk Committee. She succeeds Steven Joachim, who steps down from the role at the end of his three-year term.
Glasser is a recognized leader in risk, data, and analytics in financial markets. She brings 35 years of leadership experience to the chair’s position, acquired from director and managing director roles in, among others, the US Treasury, J.P. Morgan, Credit Suisse, and IBM Global Services. She also serves as an Independent Board director at Oppenheimer Holdings.
In a statement, Glasser said: “GLEIF is expanding its horizons beyond the LEI’s use in financial services and is deepening its commitment to helping organizations understand how the LEI can bring greater trust, efficiency, and transparency to any identity management system in all sectors. As the new Chair, I am committed to continue to evolve and expand the Global LEI System to enable broader LEI adoption and use. I would also like to pay tribute to my predecessor, Steven A. Joachim, who’s leadership and experience have been greatly appreciated.”
Stephan Wolf, GLEIF’s CEO, said in a statement: “Dessa’s appointment as new leader of the GLEIF Board is very welcome news. Her experience will be invaluable as GLEIF strives not only to ensure that the LEI plays an important role in the transparency of financial transactions, but also to establish the LEI and the vLEI as enablers of digital trust across multiple value chains where digital trust is a central principle. I look forward to working with her and, at the same time, I wish to thank Steven A. Joachim for his dedication while serving as GLEIF’s Chair for the past three years. During his term we have seen many positive transformations within both GLEIF and the Global LEI System that benefit the global economy and support the broad public good.”
Three new non-executive directors have also been appointed:
- Folarin Alayande, vice president at Mastercard
- Angela Kyermaten-Jimoh, Strategic Partnerships lead at Microsoft
- Luis Felipe Monterio, CEO of Cateno Payments
TransFICC opens New York office
TransFICC announced the opening of its new office in New York, staffed by Sean Murphy, Bo-Yun Liu and Khagay Nagdimov who have joined the firm. TransFICC is a specialist provider of low-latency connectivity and workflow services for Fixed Income and Derivatives Markets across asset classes such as rates and credit bonds, repos, mortgage backed securities and interest rate swaps.
Sean Murphy joined as senior sales executive to lead North American new business. He was an integral part of the management team that brought BrokerTec from being a concept to being the dominant platform in the US Treasury marketplace, culminating in the sale to CME Group in 2018. At BrokerTec his mandate included leading a global sales team of 20 people located in Asia, Europe, and North America. Since 2018, Sean has worked at Dealerweb and Bank consulting engagements.
Bo-Yun Liu joined as pre-sales engineer to lead Client Architecture Solutioning globally. Liu is an ex-US rates trader with over a decade of experience in fixed income markets, in roles including trading, technology, and product management, and with institutions ranging from O/EMS vendors, interdealer brokers, sell-side banks and fintechs. As a pre-sales engineer, Liu engages with TransFICC clients in Product Architecture, Tech Strategy and Market Structure to define product fit and roadmap.
Khagay Nagdimov joined as pre-sales engineer. Nagdimov comes from a software engineering background in the financial industry. He started his career at TD Securities building software for fixed income teams. He then moved to fintech startup dv01 rising to be a technology lead building out APIs, microservices, ETL pipelines, and managing a team of developers for analytics on asset backed securities.
“With six North American clients and a presence in the New York and Chicago data centres, it is important for TransFICC to have a US office,” said Steve Toland, co-Founder of TransFICC, in a statement. ”I am delighted to welcome Sean, Bo-Yun and Khagay to our team, who all bring extensive experience and senior industry relationships, which will help TransFICC to engage with new clients in the Americas.”
SFT: ISDA appoints Shone to lead data and digital product strategy
The International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) has appointed David Shone as director of product, data and digital. Based in London, Shone will lead and drive the product vision, strategy and execution for the Association’s data and digital products.
Shone was formerly director of digital affairs at the International Securities Lending Association (ISLA). He spent three years at ISLA contributing to the Association’s work on the Common Domain Model (CDM), and encouraging digitalization and standardization within the securities finance market.
HKEX announces senior appointments for mainland China development
- Zhou Jiannan joins as head of Mainland Development and a member of Management Committee
- Zhou succeeds Mao Zhirong, who becomes strategic advisor for the Greater Bay Area and China Commodities
Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEX) announced senior management appointments that will support the Group’s continued strategic development. Zhou Jiannan has been named managing director and head of Mainland Development.
Zhou joins HKEX from Jiahe Asset Management in Shanghai, where he was chair since 2021. Previously, he was CEO at Everbright Securities, CEO at Dacheng Asset Management and had served in several roles at the China Securities Regulatory Commission, most recently as deputy director-general at the Department of Listed Companies Supervision. He was also assistant president at the Shenzhen Stock Exchange.
In his new role, Zhou will lead HKEX’s engagement with key Mainland regulators and partners, supporting the Group’s ongoing strategy to leverage its China strengths, connecting China and the world.
HKEX chief exec, Nicolas Aguzin, said in a statement: “In making these appointments we are further strengthening our Mainland China expertise, reach and knowledge, ensuring that we are placing this important market at the heart of our vision for the future and supporting the Group’s efforts to capture future opportunities.”
FINBOURNE appoints former BNP Paribas Securities Services head to lead Product Marketing and Solution Positioning
FINBOURNE Technology announces the appointment of Neil Ryan in the role of head of Product Marketing and Solution Positioning. This appointment marks another milestone for the global SaaS technology business, which serves leading financial services firms with its cloud-native data management solutions.
With over 25 years of global experience in data strategy, product development, business intelligence, data governance and data architecture, Ryan brings a wealth of domain knowledge to FINBOURNE’s Product team. Having pursued senior data & analytics roles at Citi, EY and most recently as global head of Investment Analytics & Data Services at BNP Paribas Securities Services, he will leverage his business and technical expertise to effectively communicate the value proposition of FINBOURNE’s product suite across buy and sell-side clients.
Ryan said in a statement: “This is an exciting time to be joining FINBOURNE, and to be a part of the growing momentum around its cloud-native solutions. Having spent much of my career in positions at leading financial services firms, I am excited to apply my business and technical knowledge to drive FINBOURNE’s growth strategy, as it continues to build its presence across buy and sell-side firms globally.”
Thomas McHugh, CEO and co-founder at FINBOURNE, said din a statement: “We are pleased to welcome Neil to FINBOURNE. As we continue to scale, he will play an important role in helping to communicate our unique proposition to the industry. I look forward to Neil applying his extensive market knowledge to drive our success and our goals of increasing transparency and reducing the cost of investing.”
Cboe promotes Jill Griebenow to serve as EVP, CFO, treasurer and chief accounting officer
Cboe announced the promotion of Jill Griebenow to executive vice president, chief financial officer and treasurer, replacing Brian Schell who will be departing the company to pursue a new professional opportunity outside of the exchange industry.
With more than 20 years of experience, Griebenow has served as chief accounting officder since 2018, a role she will also continue to hold. Prior to that, Griebenow was chief financial officer of Cboe’s European operations, charged with managing the company’s overseas financial arm, as well as overseeing the human resources and administrative functions in Europe.
“During her 12-year tenure at Cboe, Jill has made significant contributions and her leadership has helped drive our vision and strategy, enabling us to become the global market powerhouse we are today. She has held many roles across our global organization and has an incredible understanding of our business, bringing the breadth and depth of expertise needed to serve in this new role,” said Ed Tilly, chair and CEO of Cboe Global Markets, in a statement. “I want to thank Brian for his passion and commitment to Cboe during what has been a remarkable period of transformation and growth for our company. We wish him all the best in the future.”
“I am very excited about the future of Cboe and I look forward to assuming this new role,” Griebenow said in a statement. “Together with our strong leadership team I look forward to continuing to execute on our global strategy, building on the solid foundation we have laid.”