Boston-headquartered State Street has hired a former Credit Suisse executive for collateral management in the region.

Sam Edwards joins State Street as APAC head of collateral management, according to a statement, effective immediately. 

Based in Hong Kong, Edwards will report globally to Staffan Ahlner, global head of collateral management, and regionally to Michele Hardeman, APAC head of global markets.

Edwards has nearly two decades of experience in securities finance, and liquidity and financial resource management. He was most recently with Credit Suisse where he spent 12 years, last as its APAC head of central collateral desk. Previously, he also spent six years with the former Lehman Brothers on the equity and fixed income secured financing desk.

UMR Readiness 

Financial institutions will be entering into the fifth phase to comply with the Basel Committee and IOSCO’s (International Organization of Securities) ‘Uncleared Margin Rules’ (UMR) next month.

But a recent State Street survey revealed that «more than 80 percent of institutions are unprepared to comply with all facets of the next phases of the UMR».

«Institutions in scope for these rules must have strong counterparty relationships plus a range of sophisticated operational and analytical capabilities to assess their exposure and ensure compliance,» said State Street. 

«Some buy-side clients have taken the UMR regulation as an opportunity to review their end to end and front to back strategy when it comes to collateral to ensure they maximize access to liquidity and transformation opportunities whilst solving for regulatory compliance.»

Collateral+

Supporting State Street’s ambitions in the area is its collateral management solution, Collateral+ which is an integrated platform with tri-party, third party and margin management which enables clients to tailor their collateral management service, solve UMR compliance issues and increase overall operational efficiency. 

«With […] Collateral+, clients will have a strong understanding of their regulatory obligations through our complimentary assessment of their portfolios and prepare them to meet new requirements with confidence, minimizing their cost of collateral with our analytical tool and driving efficiency in their operating models with our end-to-end capabilities,» said Hardeman. 

«With this integrated, data-driven platform, combined with Sam’s local knowledge and expertise, we are well-positioned to support our Asia Pacific clients in improving operational efficiency, achieving UMR compliance and managing risk and liquidity by streamlining their collateral program.»