Cloud was a key focus area within a panel discussion on the next stage of data integration and analysis that took place last week at the Fixed Income Leaders Summit (FILS), with the advancement said to have the potential to help enhance execution performance.
Data has increasingly become available for trading teams, however, as discussed among other panels at the conference, it is only beneficial if clean and appropriate. Access to data is key for the next stage of data integration and analysis to be truly actualised.
“We believe all our trading team should be able to consume data in its entirety from the get-go. We don’t believe in barriers to accessing the data. We try to democratise it as much as possible,” said Odin Costa, senior fixed income trader at Dimensional Fund Advisors.
“By giving people access to the data, this might create different ways of doing things. That’s quite a powerful story that we want to keep fostering.”
Cloud has helped bolster this access while also providing additional ways in which data can be consumed and this has resulted in a complete change in the landscape, added Kevin Flood, head of trading and execution analytics at Royal London Asset Management.
“You now have the ability to build out team databases which you can work on, sandbox, and do some experimental stuff, without affecting other users,” he said. “You can share amongst teams, and you can really do some interesting prototypes with that kind of data.”
Data providers acknowledge that they recognise clients’ desire to consume data where it’s most efficient for them and most practical for them. In some cases, this means building a full API suite where they can interact with data and integrate it where they need to inside their own platforms.
“It also means delivering the full set of analytics in some cases, so that they can incorporate it into their own platforms that they have with whoever their cloud provider is,” said Kevin O’Connor, global head of analytics at Virtu Financial.
“In some cases, we’re still delivering large time series in file formats because it’s going to another platform that is going to combine it with many other data sources and it’s the most efficient way. There’s still plenty of file delivery going out there. We’d like to push everybody to an API infrastructure that we control but recognise that that is not how all people consume data.”
Echoing a similar sentiment, Costa added that they’re not fully there yet when it comes to data using the cloud, with legacy systems still taking precedence.
“We have more of a legacy system where all the data has to be ingested and integrated. We need to take care about how we provision it, how we rationalise it and then how do we manage all of the computing power which is done in house.
“Once you move to the next step into this cloud computing world, you reduce this problem. It’s definitely a better world to be in and something that we’re also looking forward to.”
Guido Galassi, head of domestic markets and data at MTS Markets, added that “the challenge is to upload huge data sets, clean them and make them usable, but it also brings benefit because it makes our data more distributable.”
Cloud adoption and its usage for data analysis and consumption does, however, continue to gain traction among trading desks, with many acknowledging the benefits that it provides.
“The cloud computing element now is a fundamental enabler for our data ideas on the desk. It allows size of data, speed and scalability. It also allows you to collaborate across teams,” added Flood. “It’s fundamentally what we need on the desk to build out trade ideas, liquidity ideas and getting through to the PMs.”
As with any technological advancement, benefits can be accessed if approached appropriately. The pairing of cloud and data has the power to democratise data access as panellists mentioned, alongside helping improve execution strategies based on these strategies.