A cyber readiness assessment provides effective preparation for companies wanting to avoid the high cost of technology solutions, according to James Weare of Duff & Phelps. Organisations are less than five months away from being subject to the new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), making it critical that firms have begun to plan for the reporting and systemic changes required to comply.
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TRG a provider of subscription spend management software solutions, recently announced it has acquired Screen Group (“Screen”). The acquisition of Screen will further solidify TRG’s position as a global market leader in enterprise spend management. The new company will have a greater suite of complementary, innovative software solutions that will be uniquely positioned to provide the full spectrum of subscription spend management capabilities across expense management (FITS, INFOmatch), usage tracking (ResearchMonitor), enquiry management (Quest), specialist consulting services and events to many of the world’s leading financial, legal and professional services firms. Continue reading…

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has published a list of 94 firms without FCA authorisation that it understands to be offering binary options trading to UK consumers. Since January 3rd 2018, firms involved in binary options trading in the UK have been required to be authorised by the FCA.
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In an interview, Vítor Constâncio, Vice-President of the ECB talks about inflation not yet meeting its expectations. He answers questions like: is the erratic policies of Donald Trump a risk for financial stability? But also subjects like currency and wage modeartion are discussed. You can read the interview on this website.
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Now that the floor is nearly open for true open banking in Europe as a result of the passing of the PSD2 kick off date this Sunday, observers sit tight to see the scene unfold. Will we be enjoying a Danse Macabre with the incumbent banks in a leading role or a ‘Scent of a Woman’ tango, the unforgettable picture of experience and youth joining forces?
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The Federal Reserve Board announced the termination of enforcement actions related to residential mortgage loan servicing and foreclosure processing issued in 2011 and 2012 against 10 banking organizations. The Board also announced civil money penalties totaling $35.1 million against five of these 10 organizations that had not yet been fined for their mortgage servicing deficiencies related to those enforcement actions.
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The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) has published a Thematic Report on fees charged by Credit Rating Agencies (CRAs) and Trade Repositories (TRs), following the conclusion of ESMA’s supervisory review of the current fee structures in the credit rating and trade repository industries. In conducting its review, ESMA has collected and analysed information from publically available resources, periodical submissions to ESMA and dedicated requests for information from supervised entities. ESMA also maintained regular engagement with users of credit rating and trade repositories services who provided further information.
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The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) decided to delay the publication of the data on the double volume cap (DVC) mechanism for January 2018. The current quality and completeness of the data does not allow for a sufficiently meaningful and comprehensive publication of double volume cap calculations, as required under MiFID II/MiFIR, and ESMA has taken this decision to avoid creating an unlevel playing field.
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