The Securities Settlement Process - What Does the Future Hold?

Change Is Just Around the Corner

With so much movement in the securities settlement process landscape and new regulations on the horizon, it can be hard for Asset and Wealth managers to keep up. Especially when also challenged with outdated systems and manual processes. So what does the future hold for asset and wealth management organizations? In the latest Payments Podcast series guest host, Simon Pilgrim sits down with Frederic Viard, Director of Global Marketing for Bottomline Technologies, to discuss the new Shareholders Rights Directive 2 (SRD2) coming into force September 2020 and the three main challenges the industry will face to remain compliant while meeting customer expectations.

At a high level, SRD2 is an update to the original Shareholders Rights Directive that was adopted by the EU in 2007. The primary goal of SRD 2 is to give more visibility and transparency into the industry and require more accountability while also encouraging shareholder engagement by providing them with expanded voting rights. This will have a big impact on the industry as meeting the requirements will mean increased administrative efforts for the more than 8,000 EU organizations that will be affected.

What to Expect

Viard cites 3 main challenges that asset and wealth management organizations will face as the date for SRD2’s implementation quickly approaches – after all, September 3, 2020 is only 9 months away...

• Increased Cost: the administrative investment to meet these new requirements will be significant. Whether it’s the cost of adding new staff members to handle the workload or the cost of implementing new systems – increased cost of doing business will be unavoidable.

• Customer Expectations: while meeting these new regulations is mandatory, the industry can’t lose sight of customers and their growing technological expectations. Consumers used to dealing with user-friendly mobile devices and instant access to information in their private lives are coming to expect the same in their business interactions.

• Latest Technology: this last point is closely aligned with meeting customer expectations, but has its own purpose. Updating legacy systems and processes will help organizations not only provide data transparency but also secure and protect it from fraudsters.

To hear what Frederic Viard has to say about the future of the security settlement process industry and how organizations can overcome the challenges, listen to the full podcast, “The Securities Settlement Process – Keeping Up to Date with Expectation, Technology, and Regulations.”

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