Kaspersky entdeckt neue Staatstrojaner-Version
By Martin | October 18, 2011
Darüber hinaus haben die Experten einen signierten 64-Bit-Treiber entdeckt, dessen Zertifikat vom fiktiven Herausgeber Goose Cert ausgestellt wurde. Eine Signatur ist Voraussetzung dafür, dass ein 64-Bit-Windows den Treiber lädt. Allerdings akzeptiert ein normales Windows das gefälschte Zertifikat nicht, so dass bei der Installation eigentlich auch der Zertifikatsspeicher von Windows manipuliert werden müsste. Wie dies geschieht, ist bislang unklar.
Quelle heise.de
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market statistics DJ30, S&P500, Nasdaq, SMI, DAX, MDAX, SDAX, TECDAX
By Martin | October 4, 2011
unsere aktuelle brokerbase network market statistics für die Indices
NASDAQ100 nas100_statistics
TECDAX tecdax_statistics
SMI smi_statistics
SDAX sdax_statistics
S&P 500 s&p_statistics
DOW Jones 30 dow_statistics
MDAX mdax_statistics
DAX 30 dax_statistics
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unsere aktuelle brokerbase network market statistics für die Indices
NASDAQ100 nas100_statistics
TECDAX tecdax_statistics
SMI smi_statistics
SDAX sdax_statistics
S&P 500 s&p_statistics
DOW Jones 30 dow_statistics
MDAX mdax_statistics
DAX 30 dax_statistics
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Counterparty risk
By Martin | October 4, 2011
Since the downfall of Lehman, the structured products industry has been plagued by the problem of the counterparty risk, which denotes the risk associated to the bankruptcy of the issuer an investor is exposed to when investing in a structured product. Indeed, a structured product is a security issued by a bank and as such, it ranks equal to common senior unsecured bonds of the same issuer. If the bank goes belly up, any structured product it issued will fall into the bankruptcy mass and lose most, if not all of its value. So how remote is the issuer risk on YOUR product? how can you judge this risk?Pre-Lehman, the investor’s trust relied mainly on rating agencies: Moody’s, S&P, Fitch and the like. They assign a degree to the issuers, the best being Aaa (or AAA), the least being D, like Default. Any issuer had to have at least a medium grade, for example single A in order to be accepted as a serious counterparty. Problem is, rating agencies tend to react too late with their adjustments: Lehman went broke with an A2 rating. The rating agencies also gave all the AAA ratings to the mortgage-backed and credit-linked notes that imploded during the big crisis. Hence, few investors now even bother to take a look at the grades the credit agencies give to other companies, and justly so.
There is another, more accurate way to judge the financial strength of an issuer: its credit default spread, or CDS. The CDS is the yield spread, or difference in yield between different securities, due to different credit quality, that the market (and not a company or agency that may have other motives than the pure reflection of the risk) determines at any given moment for a determined period. The standard is 5 years. It’s accurate, fast and above all, independent, because it is the market that determines it (and not a US company). Let’s look at some numbers (5 year CDS as of 13th of Jan 2011):
- BNP: 123 / Soc Gen: 165 / France: 104
- UBS & Credit Suisse 99 / Switzerland 46
- ING: 151 / Belgium 205 / Netherlands 58
- Deutsche Bank 108 / Germany 59
- Barclays 133 / HSBC 81 / UK 72
- Unicredit: 211 / Italy 206
Just looking at the numbers tells us one thing: the CDS of the banks are pretty low in absolute terms and in some cases are damn near the CDS of the sovereign state they are based in. Take BNP and Soc Gen, for instance: both have been hammered during the PIIGS crisis, but ultimately, their CDS spreads are pretty near the one of France itself. So unless you would expect France to default on its sovereign debt, they are as secure a counterparty as can be for your product. I personally don’t see France letting its major banks down, even if Mr. Sarkozy bashes them on every public meeting about the financial system.
Be it as it may, in my opinion, the counterparty risk of large issuers like those mentioned above is negligible, especially if one invests in short term product maturing within, say 12 months. The reason is quite simple and can be illustrated through an example of the computer industry. Remember when Apple was nearly broke and its stock traded at a few bucks? They just had about three months of cash left before going bankrupt. Then came along Steve Jobs and we know the rest; today Apple holds about USD 50 billion in cash. You know why? Because they said: “never again”. Never again short of cash. Well, the banks had the same problem in 2008, they nearly all went broke. Many had to be saved by their sovereign states. This will not happen again: now the banks hoard the cash like dragons their gold. And well they should; they do not want to experience a similar situation again. Hence my message: there will be no default of major banks like those mentioned above withing the next three years. The structured products issued by these banks are quite safe. Beyond that… who can tell.
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Opics Risk Plus
By Martin | October 4, 2011
Opics Risk Plus is a risk analytics engine used by risk managers within their treasury and trading operations.
As a fully integrated risk management component within Opics Plus, enabling true straight through processing from front to back office, it reduces TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) for treasury and trading operations.
Opics Risk Plus delivers:
– real-time position updates covering all capital markets, derivatives and treasury instruments
– full range of Value at Risk (VaR) methodologies and backtesting
– credit loss simulation including Incremental Risk Charge (IRC) calculation
– extensive stress testing and sensitivity analysis
– portfolio benchmarking and performance analysis
– volatility and correlation estimation from times series data
– risk reporting integrated with front and back office information for complete risk transparency
– additional accounting valuation methods
| Database |
• MS SQL Server
• Oracle
• Sybase
|
| Language used |
• C#
• C++
|
| Operating system |
• Windows 2000
• Windows 2003
• Windows XP
|
| Pricing structure |
• Per seat
• Volume-based
|
| User interface |
• GUI
|
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Structured Products
By Martin | October 4, 2011
Within Misys Opics Plus, structured product transactions are created by combining various instruments into a single deal entry point.
Misys Opics Plus Structured Products supports an array of complex foreign exchange and interest rate based structured instruments. All of the structures can be issued as a note or a swap.
Structured Products support embedded calls/puts, knockout provisions and caps/floors. The structures can also accommodate customized schedules and formulas.
Misys Opics Structured Products prices and values these instruments using the pricing engine.
This module is a complete and automated front through back office straight through processing (STP) solution that allows financial institutions to increase their STP rates, reduce the cost of transactions and minimize reconciliation. Opics Plus processing includes deal capture, pricing, position management, customer credit, profit/loss, exception based workflow, payments, confirmations and accounting.
Misys Opics Plus supports the following complex structures:
CMS Spread Range Accrual
CMS Steepener TARN
CMS Steepener
Dual CCY Note
Index Linked Note
Inflation Linked Note
Inverse Floater
Inverse Floater TARN
Libor Range Accrual
Periodic Capped FRN\
Power Reverse Dual Currency (PRDC)
Snowball
Snowball TARN
Step up Callable
Triple Chooser
Zero Coupon
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Opics Plus
By Martin | October 4, 2011
Misys Opics Plus – Your Platform for Success
Misys Opics Plus is the new service oriented, smart client release of Misys Opics. It is a comprehensive treasury and capital markets solution for front-to-back office, cross-asset processing of a wide range of financial instruments. In a single system, it handles vanilla and complex derivatives, fixed income, and equity and treasury trades.
Misys Opics Plus combines unparalleled integration across financial instruments and across the different departments of a financial institution. As a result, it is the ideal solution for financial institutions looking to reduce costs through adopting a centralized approach to systems and operations.
Customers can now benefit with increased performance, scalability, flexibility and new functionality.
Award Wining Technology
“Opics Plus has received Microsoft’s prestigious Innovator Award in the Treasury & Capital Markets category”
Service Oriented Architecture
Misys Opics Plus has been developed as an open system that adheres to industry-accepted standards and incorporates the benefits of SOA componentisation.
Components can be re-used across all of the system’s instruments, enabling you to make a change to one component without having to change the entire system.
This dramatically improves maintenance and lowers time to market.
High Performance
Misys Opics Plus was designed with the clear understanding that system performance is every bit as critical as system functionality. Moving Misys Opics to the .NET environment of Misys Opics Plus has given the system a significant performance edge. The new tiered architecture allows organisations to run tasks in parallel and ensures scalability to meet the needs of your operation as they evolve.
Furthermore, by using server-based processing Misys Opics Plus can process higher volumes of transactions than ever before. As a result, the system can also scale to meet any additional volume needs as they develop.
Customizable Desktop
Misys Opics Plus allows users to customise their desktop view, quickly and easily so that they can concentrate on only the information they need. Misys Opics Plus menus, trading screens, blotters and position inquiries are all easily customised for each user or for groups of users.
Smart Client
The Misys Opics Plus smart client gives users the ability to work offline, providing far richer functionality than can be provided through a standard web-browser interface. The smart client provides an interactive and highly responsive user interface, offering users immediate access to critical data.
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