Smith & Williamson Investment Management Limited, a leading independent provider of investment management, financial advisory and accountancy services to private clients and corporates, today announced it has connected to Calastone’s independent cross-border transaction and settlement network. Smith & Williamson Investment Management Limited will benefit from Calastone’s automated approach to processing mutual fund order routing, settlement and matching and its reconciliations services.
Signing up to Calastone will enable Smith & Williamson’s Investment Management Limited clients to benefit from automation and transaction efficiencies; reduce settlement risk and standardise processes. Calastone’s reconciliation service will provide a single point of market access and will help Smith & Williamson Investment Management Limited further standardise and automate the complex reconciliation process.
Connectivity to the Calastone community is through a single connection. Orders are sent electronically via the transaction network, which provides a universal message communication and ‘translation’ service. Distributors can connect directly using their existing technology and use Calastone’s Execution Management System (EMS), providing a consolidated view of their entire order flow and enabling firms to efficiently manage any exceptions and deliver a better service to their end clients.
“Many of our fund management clients have been asking for a straight-through-processing (STP) connection to Smith & Williamson and we are delighted that they will be taking advantage of all our services from trading through to settlement and reconciliation. The wealth management community continues to back Calastone’s primary market net settlement solution and we look forward to welcoming more clients throughout 2011,” commented Alexander Hofmann, Director of Sales at Calastone.
Brian McLean, Director, Settlement & Custody Operations of Smith & Williamson Investment Management Limited added, “We’re pleased to support Calastone’s automated approach to mutual fund trading throughout the lifecycle of the transaction. Calastone’s simple, flexible approach to connecting clients essentially levels the playing field for distribution in the industry, in a highly efficient, cost effective way. Calastone is committed to delivering STP to the fund industry enabling us to increase efficiencies. We have been impressed with how easy it was to connect and have already witnessed a marked improvement in the end to end processing speeds for transactions.”
