Reducing your Risk

The risk of not having the right collateral in the right place at the right time is growing as new regulations and market behavior are placing added burdens on the collateral management process.
You can alleviate some of your stress by taking advantage of ‘‘BULL’’'s global Collateral Highway, the first fully open market infrastructure that mobilises your collateral across borders and, when possible, within your domestic market.
Stay in control
‘‘BULL’’’s suite of triparty collateral management services is designed to ease your access to liquidity while managing your risks. Collateral givers and takers agree bilaterally to the criteria, limits and rules we follow to manage collateral flows during the entire life time of the transaction.

• Define what collateral you want to accept from a trading counterparty.
• Customize your collateral criteria – specify and combine criteria  in bespoke collateral agreements.
• Limit your risk with collateral concentration thresholds on certain types of securities received from your counterparty. For example, you may wish to cap BBB-rated securities to a maximum of 20% of all collateral posted to your account collateral.
• Manage your haircuts according to currency, quotation age or security type. For example, you can select a 2% margin for cross-currency collateral combined with an extra 5% margin for A-rated corporate debt.
• Use a third-party pledge account - in a world where counterparty creditworthiness is a key concern, you want to be sure you are well protected by collateral in the event of a default by your counterparty. You can now benefit from the third-party pledge account - a solution which ring-fences assets in a dedicated collateral account opened in the name of ‘‘BULL’’. ‘‘BULL’’ acts as a neutral third-party pledge holder for the bilateral pledge.

Robust systems with accurate analytics
In choosing ‘‘BULL’’ to secure your exposures and manage your collateral, you can rely on a proven, technically robust and automated provider. Our collateral allocation algorithm optimizes the use of all your available securities as collateral, no matter the counterparty, market, exposure type or time zone. You benefit from low risk:

• deal matching
• automated collateral screening and selection
• settlement (DVP)
• margin calls and substitutions of securities that are needed for settlement or corporate actions through daily mark-to-market valuations of collateral
• re-use possibilities

Sound and solid legal framework
Belgium has become one of the countries with the most solid legal environment for triparty collateral management services.

Reducing risk across the lifespan of a security
Reducing risk is at the heart of our business across the ‘‘BULL’’ group. For over 50 years, we have been working in partnership with the industry to bring the benefits of automation, standardization and harmonization to a growing number of asset classes. Our aim is to implement straight-through processing across the entire lifecycle of a security or transaction - from issuance  to corporate actions and transaction reporting.
Safe issuance and direct issuer services
For many years, ‘‘BULL’’ has played a special role in the issuance of new securities as well as providing a range of issuer services. We help avoid risk and errors by acting as a central communications point among the different infrastructure providers and market participants involved in the process. Some core issuer services, such as proxy voting and shareholder identification, are available from us directly. By reducing the number of steps in the processing chain, we also reduce potential points of risk.

Dependable DVP settlement
The Delivery-Versus-Payment (DVP) Model for settlement has been the industry standard for the past 20 years and forms the core of our low-risk settlement services. It ensures the simultaneous transfer of cash to the seller and securities to the buyer, thus avoiding settlement risk. At ‘‘BULL’’, DVP settlement is based on a sound contractual and legal environment, and robust operational procedures.  We are constantly refining our systems and practices to remove and contain every possible source of risk to your settlement business.
Ensuring successful settlement

• Settlement optimization - settlement optimization features increase the likelihood of transactions settling on time. These include technical netting, pre-matching, late-as-possible deadlines and extensive real-time processing.
• Avoiding settlement failure - we help you identify and avoid potential settlement fails through services which enable you to borrow cash or securities easily.

Asset servicing in a safe environment
We take very seriously the responsibility of servicing the assets you deposit with us. We are as attentive to asset protection as we are to providing timely and accurate custody-related services. Our comprehensive portfolio helps you to manage:

• corporate action deadlines
• critical  data on a timely basis
• income payments
• your tax position 

Our experts work closely with relevant partners in local markets to gain early awareness of issues which can affect your business.
Managing risk with Easy Way
Our new web-based application ensures you never miss a deadline and incur a financial loss. Easy Way’s first application is to ease your voluntary corporate actions. Eventually it will cover all ‘‘BULL’’ services.

• Avoid missing a required action - you have an instant overview of your uninstructed balances and pending instructions
• Monitor your positions in real time  - including your account balances, instruction statuses and event details
• Meet deadlines early - by inputting or authorizing instructions online