The year continues to move forward, with more innovation, good news and staff moves.

Deutsche Boerse Group’s index and analytics business reported a six percent increase in revenues year-on-year. It saw net revenue increase to €934m in the fourth quarter of 2021, a growth of 15% year-on-year (Q4 2020: €814m). Net revenue for full year 2021, at €3.5 billion, was up nine percent YoY.

The financial year 2021 was defined by low market volatility, following very high levels in the previous year. This reduced net revenue in the trading segments Eurex (financial derivatives) and Xetra (cash equities).

Qontigo, the group’s index and analytics business that was created in 2019 through the combination of Axioma, Dax and Stoxx, posted net revenue of €78.4m for Q4 2021, up six percent from the prior year quarter, including €51m generated from licences.

MSCI posted operating revenues of US$549.8m for the fourth quarter of 2021, up 23.9% compared to the prior year quarter (Q4 2020: US$443.7m). Index operating revenues were US$331.8m, up 23.5% year-on-year (YoY). The increase was primarily driven by $38.3m in higher asset-based fees mainly reflecting an increase in revenues from exchange-traded funds (ETFs) linked to MSCI equity indexes. This increase reflected higher average assets under management (AuM) in ETFs linked to MSCI equity indexes, partially offset by a decline in average basis point fees on those AuM.

Recurring subscription revenues, at US$170.1m, increased by 14.4%, primarily reflecting strong contributions from market cap-weighted index products and from factor, ESG and climate index products.

J.P. Morgan has joined the roster of leading financial firms to invest in TRM crypto compliance and risk management technology. The TRM Labs platform is used by financial institutions, cryptocurrency businesses, regulators, and law enforcement agencies to monitor cryptocurrency transactions for suspicious activity and to trace the movement of stolen or other illicitly obtained funds.

The Bulgarian exchange has listed eight crypto ETNs tracking Bitcoin and Ethereum prices on BSE International. With the launch of the first crypto ETNs, BSE joins a number of European exchanges such as Deutsche Boerse, Euronext and SIX, which started trading in these instruments two years ago.

In a first for the Asian market, Société Générale (SG) has issued four daily leverage certificates (DLCs) linked to the S&P 500 on the Singapore Exchange (SGX), nearly five years after it entered the space. Available in long and short versions, the DLCs went live on 4 March offering a leverage of five times the daily return of the S&P 500.

LCL and Crédit Agricole CIB (CACIB) have partnered to launch the LCL Net Zero Carbon March 2022. The structured product meets European Benchmark Regulation criteria and includes a mechanism to offset the investment’s residual carbon emissions. This joint initiative is part of Crédit Agricole group’s Social Project and the bank’s commitment to reach carbon neutrality by 2050.

Structured product plan manager Idad has started 2022 by bringing an ultra-defensive callable play to the UK market. The UK firm has partnered with Société Générale to launch the Ultra Defensive Callable Supertracker Plan, the first single index callable plan offering 430% participation in the FTSE 100 index or 8% pa if the issuer calls the product early. The ultra-defensive feature comes in the form of 40% downside protection barrier, meaning that for capital to be at risk the FTSE 100 needs to fall by more than 60% at maturity.

Asia continues to ramp up investment in staff. Kevin (Kwang Loong) Phua, ex-director at HSBC, has returned to UBS in charge of structured products origination for Apac at global markets, according to two sources.

He continues to be based in Singapore, replacing James Chye, who has followed his ex-UBS manager Vivienne Chia to join Bank of Singapore to a new structured product desk along with two other colleagues. Phua’s licence on Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) was effective with UBS from December 2021. Phua spent three years at HSBC specialising in structured products after serving as a director and direct access clients (DAC) advisor at UBS within the investment platforms and solutions (IPS) unit from 2013 to 2017. This was merged under UBS global wealth management (GWM) in 2018.

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