Markit Selected By UBS For Index Management in Bid to Streamline Compliance

Markit (Nasdaq: MRKT), a global provider of financial information services, has been selected by UBS Investment Bank to help calculate and leverage the bank’s investible indices, according to a Markit statement.

Markit’s suite of coverage encompasses a wide range of asset classes, including equities, fixed-income, and macroeconomics, among others. The group also leverages index services for institutional clients across over-the-counter (OTC) and exchange-listed asset classes.

The new partnership with UBS Investment Bank is important for both parties as it will help facilitate the delivery of the lender’s index offering under a more streamlined mantle of compliance for clients.

According to Xavier de la Porte du Theil, Head of Investment Strategies Structuring at UBS, in a recent statement on the selection: “We are very pleased to be able to provide investors with the benefits of independent third-party benchmark administration by engaging Markit.”

“Markit’s governance and oversight structure, together with its deep index expertise, will help UBS satisfy regulatory best practices while also enhancing our ability to efficiently deliver leading index products to our clients,” he added.

“With Markit’s deep expertise in providing complex and diverse indices and our robust systems and compliance framework to address existing and emerging benchmark regulatory requirements, we can provide UBS with an efficient and transparent alternative to in-house index management. This will allow the bank to more easily achieve regulatory best practices and concentrate on its core business of delivering financial products to its clients,” noted Adam Kansler, Co-Head of Information at Markit in an accompanying statement.

Last week, Markit made headlines after it to the Markit’s iBoxx family of indices for an undisclosed financial sum. Markit’s iBoxx suite constitutes a number of indices, including a focus in Asia – its iBoxx Asian Local Bond Index (iBoxx ALBI), Markit iBoxx Asian USD Bond Index (iBoxx ADBI), and Markit iBoxx Asian USD High Yield Bond Index (iBoxx AHBI) are all part of a leading brand in Asian markets, which Markit aimed to reinforce with HSBC’s assimilated indices.