In the FICC of It Colin Lambert, Profit & Loss

There is plenty for Colin Lambert to ponder in this week’s podcast as he reviews the feedback to his recent comments suggesting the NDF market doesn’t need fragmentation, lets listeners in on the background to something that has been puzzling him, and then, with no little trepidation, he “tiptoes” into Cryptoland. Of course, there is no such thing as him doing anything delicately so kicking off with a blast at what he sees as rather simplistic market analysis, he then looks at not only the growing interest of the authorities in crypto markets but also at a new product that, Lambert believes, highlights just why retail markets in these products must be regulated.
Lambert is then joined by Adrian Patten, chairman of Cobalt to discuss the crossover between digital assets and foreign exchange markets. Patten, who admits to being a sceptic on the price of bitcoin, talks about how the technology in the digital world is gradually transforming fiat markets, especially in the post-trade space. He also explains how Cobalt is using a Stablecoin to drive change and build efficiency levels in the post-trade space, and how he thinks the world will look in just a few years’ time.
There are, naturally, people who remember Patten and Lambert from their days trading spot Cable, if nothing else, listen to this podcast to find out how one, at least, can discuss something other than ‘yours’ and ‘mine’!

There’s a behavioural feel to this week’s podcast as Colin Lambert opens up with his views on the number of spoofers being brought to heel by the CFTC. He then moves onto another CFTC-related issue, wondering if questions should be asked of the management team that allowed Citi’s voice monitoring operation to descend into apparent chaos – leading to a CFTC fine. Finally, in yet another inspired(!) prediction, Lambert wonders if a deal announced this week signals the retreat of voice brokers from the hybrid model.
Lambert is then joined by Guy Hopkins, founder and CEO of FairXchange, to discuss how data and analytics is changing the face of the FX relationship. With the firm’s pricing stack analysis tool newly launched, Hopkins explains how LPs and customers are using it and what it can really tell about a relationship.
Lambert, predictably, wants to “out” those LPs who claimed they “stayed in” during the Covid peak when anecdotal evidence suggests many didn’t, but thankfully for the listeners the conversation soon turns to another aspect of the FX relationship – managing a panel of LPs in a world in which customers want less. And as Hopkins explains, sometimes when looking at the relationship, less can mean more. 
Download and listen to find out more.

In this week’s podcast Colin Lambert gets his teeth into one of his favourite subjects – spoofing – and, as usual, has some theories about lessons that can be learned elsewhere. 
Ahead of Forex Network Chicago later this week, however, which will kick off by a panel looking at the FX swaps market structure, the majority of the podcast looks at a new initiative in that space as Lambert is joined by Andy Woolmer, CEO of New Change FX to talk benchmarks for FX swaps and currency beta indices. Woolmer explains the thinking behind the new products and answers Lambert’s questions about how the benchmarks deal with the “turns” that create so much upheaval in markets and there is also time for a philosophical discussion about benchmarks generally. 
The new currency beta indices prompt a lively discussion about the performance of currency managers generally, but Lambert is particularly interested in one aspect of the indices – the ability to trade FX swaps without the credit, collateral and capital overhang. So, are they the future? Download and listen in to find out.

There’s a slightly different feel to this week’s podcast as Colin Lambert is, not for the first time, given an education in the workings of Profit & Loss! With Forex Network Chicago nearly upon us, Michelle Hemstedt, commercial director at P&L, joins Lambert to explain how our virtual event is going to work, including an explanation of the virtual booths in the virtual exhibition hall.
Fresh from understanding how we are putting the “Network” back into Forex Network, Lambert takes a look at three matters from the past week that have tweaked his curiosity. Is he right to see potential tensions building between buy and sell side if a recent report is right? Is the FX swaps market, finally, ripe for change? And what does the flight of risk capital from market making businesses mean for the FX industry. 
All questions are answered…almost…in this week’s In the FICC of It.

The podcast has a nice positive vibe to it this week as Colin Lambert is joined by Ayesa Latif, head of EMEA e-commerce FX sales at Citi to discuss the eighth annual “e-for-education” campaign by the bank, which kicks off this week. Latif explains how the campaign works, what channels are likely to generate the funds, as well as the not for profit partners Citi’s FX team works with – she also highlights some great examples of material help the programme, which raised over $8 million last year alone, has provided.
Lambert also appears to be in a good mood when discussing the launch by XTX Markets of its first execution algo for clients, this even extends into the broader impact of the growing use of algos generally, although clouds do appear on the podcast horizon as this segment veers into last look! The changing mood continues as Lambert expresses his bafflement at the workings, more specifically the thinking, within the US Second Circuit Court of Appeals as Mark Johnson has a bid for a re-trial knocked back just days before the same court accepts a separate bid using exactly the same legal argument!

This week’s podcast kicks off with Colin Lambert discussing some of the feedback he received over his comments in the week’s column over the re-papering of trades post the SNB debacle in 2015. He does not, of course, miss the opportunity to drive home his argument that algos should have mandatory price limits, along the way dismissing concerns aired over what would happen if we have another Brexit-type event.
Lambert also has time to discuss the latest episode in the Cartel saga as well point listeners, unusually, in the direction of another podcast, before he is joined by Mike Keenan, head of currency strategy at ABSA in Johannesburg to talk about conditions in emerging markets.
Keenan talks about how market conditions have evolved along with the COVID crisis as well as about the changing correlations in markets, not least involving Turkey, Brazil and South Africa. Lambert is also delighted to hear, in the true spirit of In the FICC of It, that ABSA’s forecast for the rand in the year ahead is very much off-consensus. To find out why download and listen now.