JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Fidelity National Information Services® (FIS™), a worldwide leader in processing and technology solutions for financial institutions, announced today that its Advanced Commercial Banking System (ACBS) division has launched its fully functional Distressed Loan Trade Management and Settlement Platform on the ACBS ClearPar syndicated loan operations platform.
ACBS ClearPar is the largest automated syndicated loan operations platform, settling more than 80 percent of all Loan Syndications and Trading Association (LSTA) par loan trades. Since first launching distressed trade settlement in the first quarter of 2008, nearly 7,300 distressed trades have been entered into the system. In the initial version, buyer, seller and agent bank were able to generate, circulate and execute legal documents associated with distressed syndicated loan trades. With today’s launch, new functionality for managing distressed inventory and upstream allocations has been added as well as providing buyer’s and seller’s respective legal counsel access to fully participate in the process.
“Previously, the industry had been dependent on disparate, nonstandardized spreadsheets to manage an inefficient and complex process of allocating inventory to trades and managing upstreams,” said Scott Kostyra, senior vice president for ACBS. “With ClearPar, this process will be streamlined and standardized across the industry which, in turn, will considerably reduce all-in costs and settlement times associated with distressed trades.”
“Over the last year, we have been actively engaged with our sell and buy-side customers and legal advisors in developing the distressed management and settlement platform,” said Richard Levy, president of the ACBS division. “With this release, ClearPar has extended its reach beyond just the settlement of trades by adding functionality which allows our customers to manage their distressed inventories more efficiently, more accurately and in a way that will provide a standard for the industry.”
Atilla Karasapan, managing director, Citi, agrees. “We are pleased that ClearPar has been able to provide a workflow solution which facilitates the process of managing and closing distressed trades to enable the market to reduce settlement timeframes and related operational risk.”
In addition to Citibank, many other ClearPar customers active in distressed trading have been using the distressed platform or have agreed to commence usage with this new release.
Adding distressed trade settlement to ClearPar’s industry leading LSTA and LMA par settlement platforms further facilitates the industry goal of reducing settlement times and, consequently, operational and counterparty risk while at the same time providing loan market participants with a single, global platform to streamline loan operations processes.
About Fidelity National Information Services
Fidelity National Information Services, Inc. (NYSE: FIS), a member of the S&P 500, is a leading provider of core processing for financial institutions; card issuer and transaction processing services; and outsourcing services to financial institutions and retailers throughout the world. FIS has processing and technology relationships with 40 of the top 50 global banks, including nine of the top 10 and has been ranked the number one banking technology provider in the world by American Banker and the research firm Financial Insights in the annual FinTech 100 rankings.
ACBS Loan Systems, a division of Fidelity National Information Services, Inc., is the leading global provider of software and technology solutions to financial institutions, on both the sell and buy side, that participate in the commercial loan market. ACBS products automate, streamline and integrate every phase in the life a loan – origination, syndication, servicing, trading, portfolio management, reporting and analysis – from the middle market to the largest syndicated credits. Twenty of the top 25 global financial institutions, ranked by tier 1 capital, use ACBS commercial loan software. The products operate in real time in any currency. ACBS products run on Windows and IBM i-Series platforms or through an application service provider (ASP) and are licensed by more than 90 leading financial institutions.
Headquartered in Jacksonville, Fla., FIS maintains a strong global presence, serving more than 14,000 financial institutions in more than 90 countries worldwide. For more information on Fidelity National Information Services, please visit www.fidelityinfoservices.com
Forward-Looking Statements
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