Speaking to InvestorDaily, SunGard vice president of Asset Arena InvestOne Tony Warren said the lines between investor protection and investor taxes around the world are rapidly becoming blurred.
In addition, the growth of cross-border trading – which inevitably involves multiple currencies and different tax and accounting regimes – puts “onerous burdens” on asset managers responsible for tracking daily portfolio valuations.
“As soon as you reach automation, I can guarantee you that coming down the track are two or three new laws in the areas that are going to affect you, and it’s going to require a change to operations,” said Mr Warren.
It is important for software firms like SunGard to “future-proof” their applications in order to encompass regulatory change as it occurs, he said.
But while some regulatory regimes are very good at providing plenty of notice about upcoming changes, others are “awful”, said Mr Warren.
He highlighted the French government’s introduction of a transactions tax in a six-week period last year as a particularly notorious example.
“Investor taxes tend to be shoved in quickly. Germany was another example where there was a change in the need for fund transparency,” said Mr Warren.
SunGard is looking to bring its global capability (ie, its ability to deal with Dodd-Frank and FATCA regulation) into the Australian market, he said.
The software company hosts a Regulatory Insights thought leadership program with global consultants such as KPMG and Deloitte.
“We look at priorities and roadmaps and look at what we need to be doing to protect the automation and from having to do things manually again,” he said.
Seventy per cent of InvestOne’s clients are web-based and take advantage of SunGard’s software-as-a-service offering, Mr Warren said.
