What people say about us
These quotes come directly from members or are taken from FMSB annual reports or press releases. Thank you to everyone quoted for your comments.
We know that financial markets are international by their very nature, the advantage of working with industry standards bodies like FMSB is that voluntary standards can have positive impact across jurisdictions.
The Treasury Market Practices Group (TMPG) and FMSB have similar goals in terms of working with industry professionals to discuss market developments and promote best practices. While we cover different asset classes, I see many opportunities for TMPG and FMSB to share our experiences and explore synergies, while also considering how our work complements laws, regulations and other standards and codes that exist in interconnected, global markets.
Ensuring consistently applied codes and standards of behaviour and conduct across jurisdictions is essential to delivering fair and effective wholesale markets. As a practitioner-led standard setter, FMSB has identified vulnerabilities where conduct risk may reside and provided clear and practical guidance that supplements existing legal and regulatory frameworks. I firmly believe that FMSB is making a valuable contribution to raising standards and building trust and confidence in FICC markets.
The Financial Markets Standards Board and The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) have strong shared interests in maintaining, and where appropriate, improving the operation of wholesale fixed income, currency, and commodities markets. We signed a Consultation Agreement in 2022 to facilitate our engagement to promote good wholesale market practices.
The industry’s evolution continues apace, and the FMSB provides a thoughtful and effective forum in which practitioners can usefully discuss and implement the range of changes required to ensure wholesale FICC markets become more transparent, fair and effective. We look forward to continuing our support for the FMSB.
Bringing together the collective, real life experience of practitioners who operate in financial markets every day, is the best way to develop standards on ethics and emphasise the importance of personal judgement. As Chair of the Conduct & Ethics Sub-Committee, it’s my pleasure to collaborate with FMSB’s members and Secretariat to help shape the industry and support them to deliver these standards.
As asset managers, we particularly appreciate FMSB’s efforts to convene market practitioners and strive for the highest standards of conduct for the global wholesale financial markets.
Specifically, we recognise the value of the Market Practices Committee’s leadership in identifying forthcoming focus areas of best market practices or the Electronic Trading and Technology Committee’s work on model risk.
Over the years, US corporations, particularly those with international operations, have become heavily dependent on the financial markets for foreign exchange and interest rate hedging products to protect their operations and balance sheets. They have also increasingly made use of the global funding markets. Trust that these market sectors function efficiently and confidence that the institutions executing their mandates are behaving in an ethical manner is crucial. Hence, US corporations are very supportive of the work which FMSB and wholesale market participants are doing in establishing Codes and Standards of behaviour.
When groups of market participants come together to pool their collective view, the results are powerful.
Breadth of participant representation has played a critical part in the impact and success of the FMSB’s standards and guidelines. It is important to ensure that the buy-side perspective continues to be brought into the relevant discussions at the FMSB Standards Board and in the various FMSB Working Groups. Constructive challenge and debate is vital to understanding the current and emerging issues and to ensure that appropriate and practical approaches are developed that will make a real and lasting difference.
The insight from senior industry experts and practitioners in the wholesale FICC markets is vital to ensure FMSB brings focus to the right issues. It is encouraging that FMSB members are proposing new areas where it can add real value. The creation of the IBOR Transition Working Group is a prime example of this in action, and I look forward to seeing the results from that work in the coming weeks.
Citigroup gives its full support to FMSB in its role to establish global standards for FICC wholesale markets, and to make them as transparent and effective as possible for all participants. As a trusted and truly global partner to institutional clients doing business in over 160 countries around the world, Citi is committed to championing global standards.
I am delighted to have led FMSB’s work on electronic trading and technology over the last couple of years.
Industry standards and guidance, whether they concern promoting high quality disclosures by trading platforms or applying model risk management frameworks in a proportionate manner to electronic trading algorithms, can be powerful in improving market
effectiveness.
Having witnessed the effects on the real economy of misconduct across FICC markets while at the Bank of England, I recognise the value that market practitioners can bring to finding the solutions which seek to prevent malpractice. I am delighted to represent HSBC in a new FMSB Working Group aimed at considering conduct risks arising from the transition from IBOR to risk-free rates, and exploring how we can provide firms with practical behavioural scenario analysis to assist in managing these risks.