The WealthCraft team have enjoyed the week at Sibos. We attended partly because it was being held in our own back yard, partly because we wanted to see what else is out there on the cutting edge and partly because we are passionate about fund automation and value highly being part of the SWIFT community. It was also good to catch up with some of the senior Microsoft executives, as being a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner is also fundamental to our existing and future success.

We certainly made the most of being in the reflected glow of the world’s biggest and most important financial junket:

·         WealthCraft CEO Kelly J. Tallas gave a presentation on Tuesday morning, just as the typhoon was dying down, to explain the manual administration issues that are causing corporate pension schemes to fall so far short of their potential and to announce the launch of the Pensions Administration Service (PAS).

·         A press release was issued following Kelly’s presentation to announce the official launch of PAS and a number of interviews with financial journalists followed.         

·         Another major milestone in the development of WealthCraft was announced on Thursday 17th, in the form of the acquisition of 50% of WealthCraft Systems by OneVue.

There were some surprises too, as we made good connections with people and companies we would never have run into. There are several serious opportunities to follow up which we are excited about. With innovation being embedded in WealthCraft’s culture, we are very well aware that breakthrough innovations, such as PAS, almost invariably result from combining and harmonizing existing technologies.

More broadly, it was clear to us that Sibos this year was all about banks. The week coincided with the first anniversary of the collapse of Lehmans and the mood has clearly turned from trauma to concern about the future shape of regulation, so this coloured much of the debate and conversation. What was really striking was the tasteful opulence of the Chinese banks’ stands and the confidence that they exuded compared to their battered western counterparts. It is economically and demographically inevitable that Asia will be the engine of global growth for the 21^st century, and the region’s banks clearly know it.

For us, one thing was missing from the agenda: funds automation. While we wore our “SWIFT Ready” gold badges with pride, there was a regrettable absence of fund houses in attendance. We shared the view directly with SWIFT CEO, Lazaro Campos, that lobbying fund houses to automate dealing should become a higher priority and he wholeheartedly agreed. This is not a good moment to cajole fund houses to move away from using faxes to bounce sales and redemptions around the world. While it doesn’t cost anything for them to join an automated platform like FundsMX, it does inevitably mean running manual and automated systems in tandem during the transition and that means extra resources, even though only for a short period. Sibos is about looking forward rather than dealing with immediate tactical management issues, so the senior executives could well use the time to consider the long term advantages of automation. After all, does anybody seriously expect that dealing in funds will still be done by fax in 20 years’ time?!