JPMorgan, BlackRock Warn Contagion Hitting Emerging Markets

First Read

X_TRADER Transformed The Industry: Now It’s Time To Do It Again
Jim Kharouf – JLN

The announcement that Trading Technologies will be shutting down its X_TRADER platform is not a big surprise. But what that platform has done over its 25-year lifespan certainly is. And what the new TT platform may do in the coming months and years may be equally astounding.
Taking a look back, there’s not a single ISV trading platform that has had a greater impact on the industry than X_TRADER. Launched in 1994, the technology that included patented breakthroughs like the ubiquitous price ladder and autospreader transformed the trading industry with Harris Brumfield’s trader’s eye for functionality and speed. The patents granted on the price ladder put TT at odds with many in the industry, but it also served as a sort of starting gun for the business patent race across financial markets.

Click HERE to read the rest of the story.

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Hits & Takes
JLN Staff

Amy Shelly of the OCC and Joanne Moffic-Silver, formerly of the Cboe, are the co-chairs of the LaSalle Street Trading Tech Awards, formerly the LaSalle Street Dinner in support of the Boy Scouts of America. Shelly and Moffic-Silver are the first women to chair the event that started in 1971. With girls allowed in Cub Scouts in 2018 and in the newly renamed Scouts BSA in 2019, this is the year of the woman in Scouting. More details on the event in November and the campaign coming soon.~JJL

The New Yorker has a long form story on Paul Singer of Elliott Management. The story has a slant, but it also has a lot of interesting details and color on Singer and on Jonathan Bush of Athenahealth. ~SR

CME’s interest rate futures volumes averaged 8.6 million contracts per day in August with US Treasury futures and options averaging 5.6 million contracts per day.~JK

The NIBA has secured Rick Santelli as a keynote speaker to the Chicago Fall Conference on September 13th at the CME Group. The last time I saw Santelli give a keynote address, at a conference in Canada, he pointed me out in the lunchtime audience and said “John has forgotten more about the markets than I will ever know.” Or something to that effect. Since then I have forgotten a lot more about the markets, but luckily have learned a lot more too.~JJL

The Phillip Capital Trading Asia Symposium will be on October 16, 2018 from 8 AM to 3 PM at the Union League Club of Chicago.~JJL

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The End of an Era: X_TRADER’s Final Sunset
Rick Lane – TT
Over the next year or so, we will officially begin sunsetting the X_TRADER® platform. In case you haven’t heard this term before in relation to software, it means a gradual phasing out of a platform, with specific milestones where development, services, and support end. In the case of X_TRADER, the first of these milestones will be as soon as Q4 of this year, and the last will be in early 2020, when support will end across all aspects of the platform.
/jlne.ws/2wLChLa

***** Y, X_Trader, Y?~JJL

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Ten Years After Lehman—Lessons Learned and Challenges Ahead
Christine Lagarde – IMF
The global financial crisis remains one of the defining events of our time. It will forever mark the generation that lived through it. The fallout from the crisis—the heavy economic costs borne by ordinary people combined with the anger at seeing banks bailed out and bankers enjoying impunity, at a time when real wages continued to stagnate—is among the key factors in explaining the backlash against globalization, particularly in advanced economies, and the erosion of trust in government and other institutions.
/jlne.ws/2MV561O

****** Get ready for more retrospectives.~JJL

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MWE World of Opportunity – Lessons from My Crypto Career Risk

JohnLothianNews.com
“[In July 2000, my boss] said, ‘Tim, tomorrow you’re going to start on the equity derivatives desk at JP Morgan.’ I was like, ‘Fantastic. I’m super excited.’ I go home, no one really has a laptop, I got my first cell phone two weeks before – it’s not web-enabled – so I go bring out a red Merriam-Webster dictionary and look up ‘equity’ and ‘derivative.’ All right, I’m ready for my first day tomorrow. I had no idea what it was. But that didn’t stop me.”

Tim McCourt, managing director, global head of equity products and alternative investments at CME Group, had no idea he would end up in finance. At first, he wanted to be a lawyer. Then he realized what law school would cost. He didn’t know exactly what to do next, so he figured business in the general sense would do the trick.

In this video from MarketsWiki Education, McCourt talks about how to alter your career path when necessary and how curiosity and a willingness to learn can be your best friends.

Watch the video here »

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Disrupting Who You Know To Bolster Students’ Life Opportunities
Michael Horn – Forbes
My freshman year at Yale, I took an introduction to international relations class with the late, great Professor H. Bradford Westerfield. The course was notable for Westerfield’s informative, entertaining, and occasionally sweeping statements, including this one: “It’s not what you know. It’s who you know.”
/jlne.ws/2NmeomN

*****If you are learning online, where do you make friends and connections? Good question.~JJL

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T4Youth Registration Has Opened; Chicago’s tech community to “rally” together for 5th consecutive year to raise money and create opportunities for underserved high school students
T4Youth via Medium
T4Youth, Chicagoland’s charity tech table tennis tournament, is now accepting team registrations and corporate sponsorships for the blockbuster annual event, which benefits The Chicago Tech Academy (ChiTech), Chicago’s only public high school to incorporate wall-to-wall project-based learning, entrepreneurial principles, STEM coursework, and real-world experiences with Chicago companies into the curriculum. This year’s tournament will be held on November 14, 2018, at SPiN Chicago, and the winner will earn the title of number-one corporate table tennis team in Chicago. Teams can register on the site: www.T4Youth.com.
/jlne.ws/2M0LLaj

***** STEM and table tennis. What to wear?~JJL

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Tom Hanks Joins Cantor Fitzgerald CEO at 9/11 Memorial Fundraiser
Amanda L Gordon – Bloomberg
Hanks brings his son Truman, who was 5 when Twin Towers fell; Event raises more than $3 million for memorial and museum
Tom Hanks’s son Truman was 5 when the Twin Towers fell in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Making sure he understands that day is one reason his parents brought him to a benefit for the 9/11 Memorial & Museum.
/jlne.ws/2MQ3Qgl

***** I remember walking my 5 year old son Tim home from school that day.~JJL

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Wednesday’s Top Three
Our top read story of the day yesterday was the Crain’s Chicago Business piece CME aims to buy B shareholders’ board voting rights. Second was Brian Mehta‘s piece Diary of a Fintech CMO: How to Capture Company Culture on Camera. Third was the Chicago Tribune article Rahm Emanuel’s departure causes uncertainty for Chicago businesses

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MarketsWiki Stats
132,069,583 pages viewed; 23,270 pages; 214,840 edits
MarketsWiki Statistics

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Lead Stories

JPMorgan, BlackRock Warn Contagion Hitting Emerging Markets
Ben Bartenstein – Bloomberg
Every emerging-market currency has fallen in past six months; Dollar strength ‘not a good story’ for EM, JPMorgan says
First came the Argentine selloff. Then Turkey. And before long, assets from South Africa to Brazil and Indonesia were getting hit in a selling stampede across emerging markets.
/jlne.ws/2MOxlzj

SEC’s Stock Trading Experiment Cost Investors Over $300 Million, Study Finds; Regulator’s move to change ‘tick size’ of trading in certain stocks was designed to encourage IPOs
Alexander Osipovich – WSJ
A Securities and Exchange Commission experiment designed to stimulate trading in shares of smaller companies has cost investors more than $300 million in the past two years, according to a study released Thursday. The study by brokerage Pragma Securities LLC adds to a growing body of research that suggests regulators’ Tick Size Pilot Program has added to investors’ costs without doing much for the small and midsize companies it was meant to help. The program was mandated by the SEC after pressure from some members of Congress.
/jlne.ws/2NmjnUx

Lehman insider: why the bank could and should have been saved; The former chief administrative officer considers the argument for a bailout
Scott Freidheim – FT
In 2008, the collapse of Lehman Brothers triggered a global financial crisis. A decade later, commentators are debating whether federal officials could have prevented the crisis by supporting Lehman as it did other banks soon afterwards.
/jlne.ws/2NfmvSr

Crypto World Rocked After Long-Time Advocate Backpedals
Camila Russo – Bloomberg
It’s a dark day for crypto when one of the best known platforms offering peer-to-peer trading, more in line with the original vision for Bitcoin than centralized exchanges, will start asking users for personal information. Erik Voorhees, chief executive officer of cryptocurrency exchange ShapeShift AG, said in a blog post on Tuesday the platform is launching a membership program, which “requires basic personal information to be collected.” and will “become mandatory soon.” It seems like an about-face for the platform which Voorhees said was known as “the exchange without accounts.”
/jlne.ws/2NijAbD

Lloyds becomes first bank to sell Sonia-linked bond; £750m deal uses alternative reference rate to scandal-hit Libor
Kate Allen and Philip Stafford – FT
Lloyds Banking Group has become the first bank to price a bond using the reformed interest rate benchmark Sonia, by selling £750m of debt that is linked to the alternative for scandal-tarnished benchmark Libor.
/jlne.ws/2NohIhw

Why the World Is Watching Canada’s Pot Legalization
Jen Skerritt – Bloomberg
All eyes are on Canada as it prepares to legalize recreational marijuana in October, becoming only the second country to do so after Uruguay. The pending change has touched off an investment boom and pushed up valuations of Canada’s cannabis producers. They’re enjoying a first-mover advantage as medical and recreational pot gain traction from the U.S. to Germany. Canada’s industry will also be the litmus test for whether governments can stamp out illicit sales, transfer billions of dollars in revenue to an emerging industry, generate taxes and create jobs.
/jlne.ws/2MT2pxU

Warren Buffett Explains the 2008 Financial Crisis
WSJ Video
A decade after the financial crisis, billionaire investor Warren Buffett explains what was behind the 2008 mayhem, what we can do to limit the damage and opportunities missed last time.
/jlne.ws/2NlKxuZ

FBI Investigating American Express Foreign-Exchange Pricing; Office of the Comptroller of the Currency also looking into the matter
AnnaMaria Andriotis – WSJ
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has launched a probe into pricing practices within American Express Co.’s AXP -1.24% foreign-exchange unit, according to people familiar with the matter.
/jlne.ws/2MTffMn

Ex-Cantor trader alleges unethical trading practices at firm
Attracta Mooney in London – FT
A former high-yield trader is suing Cantor Fitzgerald for £1.2m in a British employment tribunal case claiming he was unfairly dismissed after raising whistleblowing concerns about alleged unethical trading practices at the New York-based investment bank.
/jlne.ws/2NmtSap

Exchanges, OTC and Clearing

Byron Baldwin: alpha generating strategies for European Fixed Income
Eurex
Generating Alpha in European Fixed Income is extremely difficult. In his latest article Byron Baldwin, Deputy Global Head, Fixed Income Trading & Clearing Sales, explains how Eurex with its globally unique offering of fixed income futures can generate a number of very efficient leveraged relative value / duration neutral strategies for the buy side and sell side.
/jlne.ws/2Nn0kcQ

EurexOTC IRS: Update of liquidity factors and decay factor with effect from 13 September 2018
Eurex
The liquidity factors for EurexOTC IRS are part of a regular review and will be updated prior to the first intraday calculation run on 13 September 2018.
/jlne.ws/2NlVjkV

Intercontinental Exchange Reports August 2018 Statistics
ICE
Intercontinental Exchange, Inc. (NYSE:ICE), a leading operator of global exchanges and clearing houses and provider of data and listings services, today reported August 2018 trading volume and related revenue statistics, which can be viewed on the company’s investor relations website at http://ir.theice.com/ir-resources/supplemental-information in the Monthly Statistics Tracking spreadsheet.
/jlne.ws/2MTcxGW

Market Data: The Lifeblood Of Efficient Engagement In Global Markets; A New Study by Columbia Business School Professor Charles Jones Adds Substance and Dispels Myths about Information Produced By U.S. Equity Markets
ICE
Columbia Business School Professor Charles Jones has released a research paper that examines the role and evolution of equity market data, and reaffirms that exchanges deliver moderately priced, high value market data that enables users to fuel investment decisions for better business returns. The New York Stock Exchange commissioned the paper to provide the industry with a fact-based review of the U.S. equity exchange market data landscape.
/jlne.ws/2NmPS51

Nasdaq August 2018 Volumes
GlobeNewswire
Nasdaq (Nasdaq:NDAQ) today reported monthly volumes for August 2018, on its investor relations website.
/jlne.ws/2MTmXpN

Straits Times Index (STI) Quarterly Review September 2018; Dairy Farm International Holdings to be added to the STI
SGX
FTSE Russell announces that there will be one change to the constituents of the Straits Times Index (STI), following the September quarterly review. Dairy Farm International Holdings will be added to the index and, as a result, StarHub will be excluded.
/jlne.ws/2NkCwqe

Fintech

Artificial intelligence faces public backlash, warns scientist; Researchers and companies urged to engage in debate on risks and benefits of AI
Clive Cookson, Science Editor – FT
Artificial intelligence will face a backlash from the public unless researchers and companies make a much greater effort to engage society in its development, one of Britain’s leading scientists has warned.
/jlne.ws/2MTm2G3

BNY Mellon targets AI and robotics with appointment of digital head; BNY Mellon has appointed a head of digital to drive the bank’s strategic digital direction and focus on new technologies.
Hayley McDowell – The Trade
BNY Mellon has appointed a head of digital in a newly-created role as the bank seeks to build a global team focusing on technologies such as machine learning and artificial intelligence.
/jlne.ws/2MVo3Sb

DBS CEO Says Fintech Firms Need More Scrutiny by Regulators
Chanyaporn Chanjaroen, Enda Curran, and Haslinda Amin – Bloomberg
Regulators need to increase their scrutiny of non-bank firms that are moving into the financial business, according to the chief executive officer of DBS Group Holdings Ltd., Southeast Asia’s largest lender.
“Absolutely,” Piyush Gupta said when asked at a Bloomberg forum in Singapore whether more regulation is needed for technology and other firms that are competing with traditional banks for payments and settlements business.
/jlne.ws/2wNRvP4

Citi Seeks Credit Markets Edge With New Fintech Investment Group
Alastair Marsh – Bloomberg
If you can’t beat them, join them. Or maybe invest in them.
That’s the ethos at Citigroup Inc., which has created a group to invest in financial technology companies to get the first look at innovations that could reshape debt markets. The Wall Street giant joins a growing number of established lenders, from Banco Santander SA to BNP Paribas SA, pouring money into technology upstarts that could change the way markets operate.
/jlne.ws/2wQmyJU

What Can Traditional Banks Learn From Fintech?
Enrique Dans – Forbes
The growing popularity of fintech and the emergence of competitors in different phases of the cycle, from new banks such as Germany’s N26 to partial service providers such as Revolut and others, or niche competitors such as Shine, highlights not just the inability of traditional banking to compete with them, but even to understand the most basic implications of the phenomenon.
/jlne.ws/2wLEYvq

Fintech Whizz Yoco Raises Further $16m After Tripling Users
Toby Shapshak – Forbes
Having tripled its user base since the beginning of last year, South African fintech startup Yoco has raised $16-million in Series B funding.
This brings the total investment into the point-of-sale company to $23-million (R322m).
/jlne.ws/2CnO5bV

Cryptocurrencies

Ignorance of Crypto-Asset Prices is not Bliss…
Dave Weisberger – Coinroutes
Crypto-assets, at their core, provide a method for trusted value exchanges between parties that have no direct knowledge of each other, paving the way for decentralized systems. The concept that decentralized, but connected systems could be THE answer to many economic problems is broadly understood. Unfortunately, there are firms in the crypto world that only pay lip service to this concept, choosing instead to promote their own vertically integrated business models. In the financial market for crypto assets, this could become a serious problem, as there is a strong need for interconnections and common standards. Such interconnectedness is required for the evolution of a true “Open Financial System,” which will require cooperation between key nodes in that system.
/jlne.ws/2MW9MEU

Crypto World Rocked After Long-Time Advocate Backpedals
Camila Russo – Bloomberg
It’s a dark day for crypto when one of the best known exchanges offering peer-to-peer trading, more in line with the original vision for Bitcoin than centralized exchanges, will start asking users for personal information.
/goo.gl/Eb5NzD

Bitcoin Falls Off a Cliff Again as Cryptocurrency Slump Deepens
Eric Lam and Justina Lee – Bloomberg
Report on Goldman pull-back adds to concerns over user base; One market watcher says next key level for Bitcoin is $5,000
Cryptocurrencies dropped sharply for the second time in less than 24 hours, sinking toward a nine-month low amid concern that broader adoption of digital assets will take longer than some anticipated.
/jlne.ws/2MT9oXp

Bitcoin drops on report Goldman Sachs shelves trading desk plans
Alice Woodhouse in Hong Kong – FT
Bitcoin extended losses on Thursday morning following a sharp fall in the previous session on a report that Goldman Sachs had put plans for a crypto currency trading desk on hold.
/jlne.ws/2NqVoDI

Cryptocurrency investors are seeing red in the bear market
Rebecca Leighton – Coin Insider
Anybody who knows anything about the cryptocurrency market knows that projects are struggling – prices and trading volumes have been dwindling.
It only seems to be getting worse and worse. The bear run is taking a toll on the market and the charts are blatant evidence of it:
/jlne.ws/2CpHI7P

Goldman’s Crypto Know-How Sought by Huge Korean Investor
Kyungji Cho, Heejin Kim, and Whanwoong Choi – Bloomberg
Korea Post chief discussed cryptocurrencies with David Solomon; South Korea’s government has taken a hard line, banning ICOs
It’s one of the last big money managers you’d expect to take an interest in cryptocurrencies.
/jlne.ws/2NnGbmZ

Swiss Blockchain Company Gains Regulator Approval, Seeks Banking License in 2019
Ana Berman – Cointelegraph
Swiss blockchain startup Smart Valor has won approval from the country’s regulators to operate in the local financial market, Reuters reported September 5.
Smart Valor will be regulated by the local Financial Services Standards Association (VQF) rather than the national regulatory agency, the Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA). The VQF is authorized by FINMA to check anti-money laundering (AML) compliance.
/jlne.ws/2CqjbPV

A Former Bitcoin Exchange Admin Could Be Key to Mueller’s Russia Investigation
CCN
A Russian citizen accused of running a cryptocurrency exchange that helped a billion dollar money laundering operation could be in possession of valuable information that could potentially expose how a group of Russians indicted recently by U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller managed to hide their money trail using bitcoin.
/goo.gl/iNbKY2

Blockchain and Elections: The Japanese, Swiss and American Experience
Henry Linver – Cointelegraph
Free and fair elections are one of the pillars of healthy democracies. From the United States to Sierra Leone, advocates of blockchain believe that the technology can bring a new level of transparency, fairness and efficiency to the electoral process. In spite of the enthusiasm of the blockchain community — and tentative support from political bodies — attempts to implement the technology have enjoyed mixed success and have faced impassioned criticism.
/goo.gl/7zzJSo

Twitter CEO Tells Congress It’s Exploring Blockchain to Help Fight Scams
Nikhilesh De and Ada Hui – Coindesk
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey told a Congressional committee Wednesday that the social media company is exploring blockchain solutions for its platform.
/goo.gl/pj8SiZ

Brian Kelly: ICOs Here to Stay, but ‘Days of a Whitepaper and a Dream’ Are Over
Ana Alexandre – Cointelegraph
In a recent interview with Cointelegraph, Brian Kelly, the founder and CEO of digital currency investment firm BKCM LLC, said that Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) are around to stay, but with some changes.
/jlne.ws/2wLEoxD

Aquis Technologies Partners With Archax On Institutional Crypto Exchange – Aquis Matching Engine/Surveillance To Power Archax Market Deal Includes First-Line Surveillance Services
Mondovisione
Aquis Technologies, the financial and regulatory technologies services arm of Aquis Exchange*, has been chosen by Archax, the institutional-grade crypto and security token exchange, to supply the upcoming market with trading technology, when it launches in the first half of 2019. Archax will take Aquis’ complete suite of exchange operations services and tools including the market-leading Aquis Matching Engine (AME), its state-of-the-art Aquis Market Surveillance (AMS), as well as operations systems and assistance in the post trade environment.
/jlne.ws/2MUWfxe

Politics

Why Trump’s US is worse off than Brexit Britain; ‘Britain will probably achieve a smooth Brexit with only modest damage by 2020’
Simon Kuper – FT
Viewed medium term, which country is most damaged — Brexit Britain or Donald Trump’s US? Many people would currently name Britain. They expect the House of Commons to vote down the UK’s withdrawal agreement with the EU this autumn, triggering a chaotic ” no-deal Brexit”. That could cause shortfalls of food and medicine, and disrupt travel and trade. Conversely, the betting must be that Trump — whose disapproval rating is at a record 60 per cent — loses office in 2020.
/jlne.ws/2MSVULw

Justice Department probes whether social media is ‘stifling’ speech
Patricia Zengerle – Reuters
The U.S. Department of Justice and state attorneys general will meet this month to discuss concerns that social media platforms are “intentionally stifling the free exchange of ideas,” the department said on Wednesday.
/jlne.ws/2NkqL34

US justice department signals pursuit of tech giants; Attorney-general says he is exploring concerns over competition and free speech
Hannah Kuchler and Richard Waters in San Francisco – FT
The US justice department signalled that it intends to pursue technology companies over competition and free speech issues, after President Donald Trump warned last week that Google, Facebook and Twitter should be careful where they tread.
/jlne.ws/2NlHdjy

Market Won’t Crash If Trump Faces Impeachment, Barclays Says
Ksenia Galouchko – Bloomberg
President Donald Trump has warned that the stock market would plummet if he were impeached. Barclays Plc disagrees.
/jlne.ws/2MRA0rL

Rescuing America from ‘the devil’s workshop’; Donald Trump’s laziness is a saving grace for international security
Edward Luce – FT
The most striking image from the latest leaks about US president Donald Trump is the staff’s description of his bedroom as “the devil’s workshop”. It packs in all we need know about why his White House is suffering a nervous breakdown.
/jlne.ws/2NnBGJd

Regulation

Sebi may soon pave the way for startup listings under separate segment; Definition widened to include non-tech firms; companies can list directly on the main board of the bourses
Ashley Coutinho – Business Standard
The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) may soon bring in a slew of changes to make it attractive for startups to list on the bourses.
/jlne.ws/2Nkrb9E

Volatility spikes underline fragilities and risks to EU securities markets and investors
ESMA
European Union (EU) securities markets, infrastructures and investors face new risks in the form of high volatility, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) said today in its latest Trends, Risks, and Vulnerabilities (TRV) Report (No 2, 2018). ESMA also re-iterated its concerns about cyber risk and Brexit risks for business operations.
/jlne.ws/2NfBsUz

Investing and Trading

Why big companies squander good ideas; The FT’s Undercover Economist on the real reasons that corporate innovation dies
Tim Harford – FT
J F C Fuller did not invent the tank. That distinction should probably fall to E L de Mole, an Australian who approached the British war office in 1912 with a design that was — in the words of historians Kenneth Macksey and John Batchelor — “so convincingly similar to those which finally went into service that one wonders why it was never adopted from the outset”.
/jlne.ws/2MS3IwX

The story of a house: how private equity swooped in after the subprime crisis
Mark Vandevelde, Joe Rennison, Christopher Campbell, Steven Bernard and Claire Manibog – FT
For personal trainer Trevor Pace, the house at 418 Homeplace Drive in Stockbridge was more than just a mansion-style home with a fireplace in the bedroom and a jacuzzi en suite.
/jlne.ws/2MQ9oYc

Now When You Mention Pot at a Conference Your Stock Surges
Elena Popina – Bloomberg
Used to be, companies needed a sober-minded business proposition to get investors hooked on their shares. Like blockchain.
/jlne.ws/2MPXDB8

Institutions

Goldman Sachs dropped from auction of £109bn Lloyds portfolio; US group’s Marcus bank is now seen as a direct competitor
Peter Smith and Nicholas Megaw – FT
Lloyds Banking Group has dropped Goldman Sachs from the auction of an £109bn investment contract, leaving BlackRock and Schroders in a two-horse race to secure one of Europe’s largest investment mandates.
/jlne.ws/2MSGFlP

Exclusive – Cargill hedge fund CarVal says rejected approach by Schroders
Maiya Keidan, Jonathan Saul – Reuters
British asset manager Schroders (SDR.L) expressed interest in buying CarVal Investors in May but the hedge fund that is owned by U.S. agri group Cargill said it was not for sale, a CarVal executive said.
/jlne.ws/2Noj4J8

Citigroup to Revamp Investment Banking With New Leaders
Dinesh Nair and Donal Griffin – Bloomberg
Citigroup Inc. promoted bankers Tyler Dickson and Manolo Falco to run a reconstructed version of its investment-banking operations.
/jlne.ws/2NrDAbW

Court rules women can sue ‘boys’ club’ Goldman Sachs
Kevin Dugan – NY Post
A federal appeals court on Tuesday allowed a 13-year-old class action gender discrimination lawsuit against Goldman Sachs to proceed. The suit was filed by four female former bankers and alleged that Goldman is a “boys’ club,” where women are sexualized, compensated less and given less-prestigious positions. The women had won class action status last March and, in the latest courtroom skirmish, Goldman tried to reverse the class action ruling. A three-judge panel of the appeals court called the Goldman effort “unwarranted.”
/jlne.ws/2NlQ9W8

Regions

China’s $29 Trillion Ball of Money Rolls to a Long-Ignored Haven
Bloomberg News
Investors flee tumbling stocks, P2P losses, debt defaults; ‘Where is the safe place to put our hard-earned savings?’
The new hot thing for Chinese savers is about as old and boring as it gets. Bank deposits, shunned for years by the nation’s return-hungry masses, are suddenly looking attractive again as higher-yielding investments prove riskier than many had anticipated. China’s household deposits rose in July at the fastest annual rate in a year — an influx that analysts say may accelerate after the nation’s stock market sank at the quickest pace worldwide, hundreds of peer-to-peer lending platforms shuttered and companies defaulted on their debt at an unprecedented rate.
/jlne.ws/2MTUaBq

These Are the Cities With the Most Ultra-Rich People
Alfred Liu – Bloomberg
About 10,000 people worth at least $30 million live in city; Asia-Pacific region is expected to see annual 8% rises
New York has lost its crown as home to the most ultra-rich people, beaten out by the rising tide of extreme wealth in Asia.
/jlne.ws/2MQuZjw

Emerging-Market Rout Is Longest Since 2008 as Confidence Cracks
Srinivasan Sivabalan – Bloomberg
Stocks, currencies witness longest bout of pessimism since ’08; Current slump beats taper tantrum, China shock in length
For stocks, it’s 222 days. For currencies, 155 days. For foreign-currency bonds, 240 days. This year’s rout in emerging markets has lasted so long that it’s taken even the most ardent bears by surprise. Not one of the seven biggest sell-offs since the financial crisis — including the so-called taper tantrum — inflicted such pain for so long on the developing world.
/jlne.ws/2MOBMdn

Off the Scale: S&P’s China-Ratings Plan Risks Too Many Triple-A’s; As credit-rating company sets up in China, it is tailoring standards and methods to ‘fit the local situation’
Manju Dalal in Singapore and Stella Yifan Xie in Hong Kong – WSJ
S&P Global Inc. is developing a custom credit-rating scale for China that will likely mean more triple-A’s, worrying investors about inflated grades.
/jlne.ws/2MRBfap

Brexit

EU `Very Clear’ That May’s Brexit Plan Has Some Good Parts to It
Ian Wishart – Bloomberg
European Union chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier doesn’t think that the U.K.’s plan for post-Brexit ties is completely unworkable, a European Commission spokesman said.
The spokesman was responding to claims made by a British lawmaker that Barnier said U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May’s so-called Chequers Plan was “dead” during a meeting in Brussels on Monday.
/jlne.ws/2CrEa58

Investors plan to keep UK asset holdings stable as Brexit concerns grow – survey
Reuters
A narrow majority of institutional investors plan to keep their holdings of UK assets stable into early 2019 as Brexit negotiations approach a crunch phase, according to a quarterly survey by State Street Corporation.
/jlne.ws/2NkD7rY

EU banks on last minute Brexit deal this autumn
Katya Adler – BBC
This autumn is dubbed “The Final Push”.
By mid-November “at the latest”, according to the European Commission, a legally-binding withdrawal agreement – by which the UK leaves the EU – and an accompanying, though not legally binding, political declaration outlining how the EU and UK envisage their post-Brexit relationship, have to be signed off by both sides.
Considering the painful process Brexit negotiations have been to date, how likely is that to happen?
/jlne.ws/2Cx7wie

Brexit Bulletin: The Path to a Deal
Emma Ross-Thomas – Bloomberg
The path to a deal with Brussels is starting to emerge. And as many Brexit-watchers have long predicted, it involves postponing some of the toughest decisions until after exit day.
Bloomberg reported on Wednesday that Germany has dropped a demand that the future relationship should be set out in detail alongside the separation. The U.K. is also now willing to settle for less detail on what future ties should look like. What this means is that all the opposition to May’s vision for Brexit – the so-called Chequers plan – doesn’t necessarily stand in the way of getting a divorce deal. Chequers is all about the future, and the two sides are now focused on just getting their split over the line.
/jlne.ws/2CpRGGh

Miscellaneous

Harvard Comes Out on Top in College Rankings; The latest WSJ/THE College Rankings show Cambridge is king. Size doesn’t matter. And money talks.
WSJ
A new ranking of nearly 1,000 U.S. colleges and universities puts Harvard University in the top spot. See how other schools ranked, analyze the data and use an interactive tool build a customized ranking that’s based on factors that matter most to you.
/jlne.ws/2NfrimT

Harvard’s Foreign Farmland Investment Mess; The university’s holdings in developing markets have proved to be more trouble than they’re worth.
Michael McDonald, Tatiana Freitas – Bloomberg
Fourteen years ago, a Brazilian farmer named Ruthardo Grun says he was terrorized by armed thugs who shot at him, burned down his shack, and chased him from land he was preparing to farm. Little did he know his battle to get the property back would end up pitting him against a company controlled by the world’s richest school: Harvard University.
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