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Banks Likely to Trim Their Customer Bases – Profit & Loss (subscription)
The capital available to bank FX businesses is much reduced compared to a short time ago; the impact of the Fix fiasco is seeing more players pull back from proprietary risk taking and pushing more towards an agency model; the lessons of the SNB event are still being absorbed; and then there is the “hot” topic of last look being openly debated around FEMR and, possibly, by certain regulatory agencies. All of this is likely to lead to several players doing what some institutions did years ago, and trim their customer bases.
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Clearing Houses Face Privacy Law Concerns – Risk Magazine (subscription)
Non-US clearing houses could face privacy law issues as a result of the trade reporting obligations placed on them by forthcoming US regulations – a clash that already affects some banks and prompted 12 national supervisors to write to the Financial Stability Board last year.
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BGC Partners to Buy Rival Brokerage GFI – Wall Street Journal (subscription)
BGC Partners has agreed to pay about $778 million for rival brokerage firm GFI Group, according to people familiar with the matter, ending a months-long hostile takeover effort.

• BGC Purchase of GFI Gets Green Light – Profit & Loss

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Pound Approaches Seven-Year High Versus Euro on Jobs Data, BOE – Bloomberg
The pound approached a seven-year high versus the euro after reports showed UK unemployment fell, average earnings rose more than economists estimated and the Bank of England said it sees inflation rising “fairly sharply” as the effects of weaker oil prices fade.
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Pressure Builds to Move More FX Trading On To Exchanges – Reuters
International regulators struggling to rein in the global foreign exchange market are finally finding some support from asset managers warming to the idea of moving more trading onto exchanges.
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