Electronic pricing, negotiation and order capture replaces manual workflows, improving efficiency and reducing data errors. Distribution reach can now be increased due to the ability to offer lower minimum trade size, greater product flexibility, expanded geographical scale meeting investment and risk management needs of all client segments.
Online hedging of client orders with leading markets has been made possible while reducing exposure to price movement risk. Clients can now be offered more competitive prices due to the guarantee of best price execution and also due to the fact that the distributors don’t require a market movement buffer in their prices as the quotes are real-time. Clients can be offered tailor-made instruments of their liking as there is no human intervention in the price discovery process.
A holistic perspective of the client relationship helps Sales desk get a 360° view of the client profile. Clients can make an informed decision while investing since they get access to the latest facts. Sales desk can better target the products for the client, taking into account the client’s need, leading to improved customer service and timely regulatory compliance, driving up client satisfaction and business sustainability.
Clients often demand tailor-made products as against a set of pre-defined catalogue of products. Ability to price such products via market-data linked pricing models complemented by smart solvers that suggest product parameters for client specified targets, helps establish a niche. Clients can now find specific solutions for their specific needs instead of buying products without any choice.
Compliance rules involved in selling structured products are constantly evolving. The ability to configure these ever changing rules aids in meeting banks' time-to-market objectives. The system automates suitability, KYC, product promotion, OTC collateral, trade approval, inbound and outbound documentation, best price execution, reporting and many such compliance functions via a configurable framework.
Servicing of a trade after it is booked involves numerous processing events including market-linked fixings, coupons, callbacks, exercises, barrier and target checks. It also requires the functionalities of margin calls, accruals, compounding, corporate actions, advice printing, notifications, payments, and accounting entries. These are now fully automated, resulting in much lower processing costs per trade, lower operational risk and significantly improved customer service.
User configuration product framework allows on-the-fly creation of new financial instruments as well as modification of existing product features. Product payoff, campaign parameters, sales commission scheme, optionality rules, derivatives clauses, fees structure, coupon and accrual rules, event schedules, business validation, order aggregation, suitability, pricing links, documentation and trade capture layout can be easily configured using the UCP toolkit. Extremely aggressive time-to-market targets can now be met for products ranging from funds, UT, deposits, and notes, to complex OTC Derivatives instruments.
Equity linked products are either packaged as note securities or offered via Request-for-Quote workflows. The pricing can be in-house or third-party. FinIQ supports products ranging from OTC options to bull ELN, accumulators and baskets. The system also allows the definition of customized payoff products with OTC, deposit and note wrappers. The entire life cycle has been automated, starting from price discovery, term sheets, order pooling, order fulfillment, allocation, limit checks, fixing, coupon and redemption along with full audit trail and audit monitoring.
FinIQ supports most traditional products such as Deposit, Loans, Insurance, Bonds, Unit Trust, Share Margin Finance and other securities. The workflows in traditional products often get very tangled due to real-world consideration such as re-investment, early withdrawal, funding cost, installment payments, past due settlement, fees, brokerage, commission, transfer, split, delivery, takeup, drawdown and many such features. Among retail, corporate, commercial and wealth management segments these workflows again vary significantly, but are still managed elegantly by the FinIQ workflow management platform. Besides FX, equity and rates linked derivatives products and traditional products, FinIQ also offers hybrid structured products via its User Configured Products (UCP) framework, making it an unparalleled product platform.
Interest rates module in FinIQ supports all three categories - bonds, swaps and notes. More advanced structured deposits or notes can be structured via a totally configurable payoff definition engine which not only facilitates order management, but also does the entire post-trade life cycle. The system handles workflows for confirmation, coupon advice, inbound document, SWIFT payments, amortization, valuation, collateral, margining, accrual, coupon, maturity, early redemption, accounting and many such post-trade processes. For custom-made products, the system allows payoff specification with complex algebra, combination of different frequencies and holiday conventions, if-then-else rules, market inputs, memory effects, alerts and watches.
From retail cash FX to complex multi-expiry or multi-underlying option strip, FinIQ supports the whole range of FX based products. The functionality includes pricing, liquidity, order management, collateral calculation, limit check, deal capture, middle office, back office, fixing, documentation and accounting. FinIQ also offers comprehensive volatility surface analytics, live market feed and links to top market markers. FinIQ’s Option Strip design tool allows the creation of re-usable structures and strategies that can be booked as ready-to-use packages hiding all the complexities of respective building blocks.