BMO Global Asset Management is making better investment decisions on behalf of its clients following the implementation of SimCorp Dimension as an investment book of record (IBOR). The asset manager says the IBOR supports consistent data in downstream applications and provides better information, faster. It has also allowed the asset manager to introduce new products more efficiently and onboard clients more quickly than was possible with legacy systems.
Todd Healy, head of investment operations at BMO Global Asset Management, explains that in 2012, after the Bank of Montreal, now BMO, acquired investment manager Marshall & Ilsley, it was possible to look at the technologies that were and weren’t working well, as well as the organisation’s manual processes. He says: “I wanted accountants to do accounting and portfolio managers to manage triggers to trade. It sounds simple, but this doesn’t happen in most firms as portfolio managers do their own reconciliations every morning.”
Deciding that BMO Asset Management could do better than this and that its employees should be relieved of the burden of managing their own book of records, Healy implemented SimCorp Dimension to use as a golden copy IBOR. Since then, the firm has been able to add products more easily and has grown its fund family by about 40%. It is also able to onboard three to four clients a week, rather than three to four clients a quarter as it did using legacy systems.
Describing the introduction of an IBOR as a huge transformation for BMO Global Asset Management, Healy says: “The greatest business advantage for us is that the IBOR provides the most up-to-date position data to drive better portfolio and trading decisions. At all times, the IBOR contains full, accurate information on which our portfolio managers can make investment decisions and traders can trade. The risk of wrong decision making based on incorrect data is simply too high to continue to ignore.”
Klaus Holse, CEO at SimCorp, adds: “While many in the industry continue to debate the merits of the IBOR, BMO Asset Management is a step ahead and has substantiated the value of having a single book of record for its clients. The IBOR’s ability to support exposure and performance measurement in near real time is a key differentiator for institutional asset managers that have to demonstrate the risk controls they have in place when pitching for new clients.”
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