June 13, 2019
The challenge
A major European retail, commercial and investment bank was seeking to grow their regional and multi-direct custody and clearing services following a restructure within the transaction banking division resulting from asset sales. Before this purchase, the client sat fifth in the global custodian rankings for custody services in their home market. The target was positioned first: a successful franchise, lacking investment as it was not seen as strategic to the incoming management.
Our approach
Our programme included running due diligence and delivering support to the decision to buy the business, establishing the programme, running gap analyses, organising teams, discovery and set up of the project, which in total ran for around 14 months, through to the completion of a documentation pack for the newly established department. We under took a detailed gap analysis, implementation plan with phasing and cost estimates, control plan for the tracking of client / assets / team on-boarding and migration activities. Our work covered:
- 240+ clients
- €207bn in assets
- the induction of 40 management and staff
- a network upgrade in support of new client processes & deadlines
- new product offerings, notably in the broker-dealer business
- new internal and external processes for settlements, clearing asset servicing and credit risk
- forming a new department
- the global custodian business
Our impact
This project created a series of new product offerings for the client, in conjunction with a newly formed approach from infrastructure groups. The analysis of service provision to 36 broker-dealers active in this market added a new customer segment to the business and enhanced the understanding of primary CSD activities locally. This in turn led to a revised approach in the majority of other markets for this client. Improvements in services and deadlines to end clients in addition to a greater efficiency of migrations for new business clients and assets as a result of enhanced processes. The programme itself materially Improved the client’s revenues in this market and improved perceptions (signalled in global custodian surveys) had a significant knock-on effect for all other markets in which the client was active across Europe.
