🎯 Project Aim
When a Trader is in the process of setting up a new transaction with a client, there are a number of checks that they need to perform before executing:
Whether the addition of a new trade in the portfolio would result in the PFE exceeding the relevant limit
What the Margin requirement is for the particular trade
Whether the trade is permissable under the relevant Trading Mandate
The project aim is to implement an API that can receive a request from each Front Office system, perform each of the relevant checks, and then return a response with the relevant information before executing the trade.
The project aim is to implement an API that can receive a request from each Front Office system, perform each of the relevant checks, and then return a response with the relevant information before executing the trade.
👥 Stakeholders
Global Markets, Credit Risk
❗Why It’s Important
Implementing an API will enable real-time decision support for traders, who typically need to send their requests to Credit Risk managers, with an average lead time of 2-3 hours for a response. In many cases, this slow time to react results in the trader missing out on the transaction.
Furthermore, having an automated API will cut down on the potential operational risk of a Credit Officer acting quickly to respond to the trader, but who might not pay the appropriate due diligence when performing the pre-trade checks.
FInally, by improving the time to retrieve the pre-trade checks, this opens up the possibility of adding more checks in the future that would otherwise take even longer if performed manually.
Furthermore, having an automated API will cut down on the potential operational risk of a Credit Officer acting quickly to respond to the trader, but who might not pay the appropriate due diligence when performing the pre-trade checks.
FInally, by improving the time to retrieve the pre-trade checks, this opens up the possibility of adding more checks in the future that would otherwise take even longer if performed manually.
✅ Benefits
APIs integrated seamlessly into trading platforms can provide real-time support for Pre-Trade Checks and necessary decision making.
By having a single Pre-Trade API that is integrated across systems, it brings consistency for all traders, rather than having different Credit Officers supporting each business each with different approaches.
APIs help to enforce the RIsk Controls and Compliance to policies – checks such as the Trader Mandate can ensure adherence to policy.
All API queries are maintained in an Audit, enabling reviews and investigations to be performed on historic requests.
By having a single Pre-Trade API that is integrated across systems, it brings consistency for all traders, rather than having different Credit Officers supporting each business each with different approaches.
APIs help to enforce the RIsk Controls and Compliance to policies – checks such as the Trader Mandate can ensure adherence to policy.
All API queries are maintained in an Audit, enabling reviews and investigations to be performed on historic requests.
🛠️ Tools Used
Postman | JIRA | Excel
🧩 My Role
Lead Business Analyst:
- Working with Credit Officers to understand the Pre-Trade Checks that they perform for Front Office.
- Working with Global Markets to validate the Pre-Trade Checks, and to determine potential new additions for potential business expansions.
- Creation of Business Requirements, where approved requirements are then documented functionally in JIRA ready for IT implementation
- Perform QA checks on each development step, to check that delivery passes the defined Acceptance Criteria
- Presentation of delivered output, with explanations, to Credit Officers and GM, for approvals, ahead of release
- Documentation of the process for Production Support to inherit the process for ongoing BAU