GFF Podcast

2025 FX, Cash & Liquidity Innovations with 360T and Clearstream

• Clearstream • Season 5 • Episode 3

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This month, we take an in-depth look at the rapidly evolving world of cash management and FX with Carlo Kölzer, founding partner of 360T, and Lars Janssen, Head of Liquidity Solutions Product Development at Clearstream. We discuss the needs of market participants and central banks as they manage multi-currency accounts in times of extreme market volatility following trade tariffs, reduced settlement cycles, and intraday repo, joined by our regular hosts Andrew Keith Walker and Christian Rossler

Speaker 1:

and welcome back to the gff podcast. Yes, yes, it's a very special season. It's our fifth season here. Uh, it's the 30th anniversary of the gff summit in luxembourg coming up next year. We've just had the 20th anniversary of gc pooling and a man who is about to have his 30th birthday. Again, it is, of course, my co-host, mr Christian Rossler. Christian, welcome back to the show.

Speaker 2:

Happy to be back and welcome to our guests as well.

Speaker 1:

Yes, we have two very special guests joining us today. Firstly, a huge GFF welcome to someone who's celebrating 25 years since they co-founded their business back in the year 2000. It is, of course, carlo Colza, who you will know as the founding partner of 360T, the red-hot, newsworthy fintech trading venue in foreign exchanges. He's the global head of FX and digital assets at the Deutsche Bursche as well. In his spare time, as it turns out because he can't have much of that he's also in charge of the digital assets segment at the Deutsche Bursche as well. He started out as an analyst in mergers and acquisitions. He then went on to work at Dresdner Kleinwert back in the day in Frankfurt and New York An old colleague there of Karsten Hiller, a Eurex who was in our last show and I guess all that remains is to say thanks for finding some time today I know you're on holiday as well joining us. A huge welcome to Carlo Kolzer. Carlo, welcome.

Speaker 3:

No, thank you. Thank you for inviting me and being part of the show today.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and a happy 25th birthday to 360T as well. Yeah, thank you, it's a big thing. It is a big thing and, of course, talking of big things, someone who is very tall and well known, cutting a dash through the gff crowd you'll have seen him there. Of course, you will know our other guest, that is, lars jansen. Uh and uh, you probably already know yards if you've had anything to do with treasury operations over the last 10 years. Congratulations, by the way, lars, celebrating 10 years the Deutsche Börse Group, so another anniversary for you. If you don't know Lars already, though, he is an expert in treasury operations and liquidity solutions. He started out as a trader. He was then head of the treasury front office trading side at Clearstream and is now head of liquidity solutions on the product management side. Lars, welcome to the show.

Speaker 4:

Thank you also from my side for having me and appreciate the opportunity to join you guys.

Speaker 1:

You're very welcome and, of course, a happy birthday to you too. Now, as you can probably guess from my upbeat and excited tone, this episode we have got two of my favorite topics to discuss here. There's going to be lashings of automation and technology, maybe some DLT. Yes, you know we love a bit of that. You know I love a bit of that, christian as well, but also one of Christian's favorite topics, cash. Our show is all about cash, cash management and liquidity, reducing capital drag all those things that Christian loves to bring into the show as well. So, christian, we've got a great lineup today to talk about this big issue. Carlo, I'm going to come to you for that big picture first and say FX volatility has been front page news again. There's euro dollar swings. There's euro yen shifts as well. It's looking good on the euro yen side. I'm told what's your view of the current FX landscape? How is it changing and what are those sort of key trends you've observed?

Speaker 3:

yeah, thank you for that question. I mean it's a. It's a big question, um, with a lot of answers in different dimensions, um, particularly this year. Um, foreign exchange is a bit of the sometimes counter asset class to to to equities. So when the world is in order and equities are smoothly going up, then normally the volatility in FX is relatively mooted. The opposite is happening this year.

Speaker 3:

The markets were wild, and are still, and we had the volatility in different levels. On the one hand side, we had intraday volatility, even in euro dollar, for up to three percent, which is difficult to manage, particularly when it's not market induced but by speeches of particular politicians. So it's it's very hard to manage for for market participants, such a such a volatility based on on single events. On the other hand side, you we really marked new highs. I mean the dollar cat dollar. Canada in april reached an all-time high. Euro yen, dollar yen are on highs, on 25 year highs.

Speaker 3:

So what that means is that it's not only for market participants that want to make money, but also for organizations that need to hedge. It's a difficult time. It's a time where they need to enter into the FX markets to hedge their positions, to balance out their portfolios and also to organize their positions, to balance out their portfolios and also to organize the operational business, because not only do we have tariffs, but also euro-dollar went down or euro-dollar went up, which means commodity prices which are invoiced in dollars are affected, the renminbi is affected, who's 100% pegged to the dollar, etc. Etc. So there's a global impact to operational businesses, to investment portfolios and allocations, as well as to speculative businesses. A wide impact that we see this year.

Speaker 1:

A wide impact that we see this year and are market participants in your experience looking more and more to sort of synchronize their post-trade asset servicing, their sort of securities planning, their repo activity, their FX, all together in one sort of liquidity toolkit to deal with changing conditions.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I mean the story is, whenever an asset class doesn't move, um, there is not so much uh focus on it and not so much uh of a management requirement. Let's say, in the moment things start to move if it's interest rates or ethics rates people start focusing on it and have to manage it, manage it more carefully. And this is exactly what is happening now. The people are much more sensitive. They are sensitive to cash. They are sensitive to fx volatility in different currencies, which influences effectively also than the cash if you have cash in different currencies, and we see that the people are managing that much tighter.

Speaker 3:

And 360T I don't know what you know about 360T, but it's not only a platform. We also have workflow solutions for our customers for corporates to deal with their subsidiaries to deal with their subsidiaries, for investment managers, asset managers to optimize their executions amongst their different funds and so on. So it's already required to give them workflow solution in order to optimize the AVAX trading positions and trading activities now, and the sensitivity on it is rising this year in particular, and it becomes really a valid asset class again.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so this feels like a good time to come to you, lars. I mean, we've heard that you know, as circumstances change, client focus is changing and we know that people want to you know de-risk their exposure to US treasuries, for example. That's a trend at the moment. We know that the impact of T plus one in the States that'll be arriving here over the next two years and that could be making changes that require different approaches to managing your cash and your foreign exchange components within that, I mean, tell us what is the toolkit that you're in charge of there at Clearstream looking like? What's your sort of big focus right now?

Speaker 4:

Let me give you the broader context from a Clearstream perspective. I mean Clearstream's core services are security, settlement and custody and we have, of course, asset services around this and we are supporting this with banking and cedary services. We operate in plus 50 markets and offer cash and fx processing services in over 40 currencies. Right this year, we have seen record high settlement volumes and also our assets under custody volumes were record high, with around 20 trillion euro equivalent. Now, when I'm saying that, I mean, of course, our core settlement activity and our core services are focused and remain very, very important for us.

Speaker 4:

But over the last four to five years, I would say, when cash was something where we had a zero to negative interest rate environment, cash was something which was rather needed for operational purposes but didn't really have a value for our clients.

Speaker 4:

Cash was rather cheap for our clients to fund and it was something operational but not strategic.

Speaker 4:

And since the last four to five years, we have seen a dramatic shift there.

Speaker 4:

We have seen rate hikes of 400 to 500 basis points and cash has regained in value dramatically, and now clients are focusing on capturing yield and reducing non-operational balances significantly while also minimizing settlement friction, and that's what we realized on the liquidity solution side, but especially on the Clearstream side, is that is an opportunity for us to expand our cash and ethics services, and we are looking to create the most value to our clients by offering cash and ethics services that are linked to the client's core flows, which are security settlement flows.

Speaker 4:

And we have seen here an opportunity and that's also why we are together here at this podcast, together with Carlo, to build a one-stop-shop solution for our clients with 360T and Clearstream, where we are offering an FX solution that is linked to our client settlement activity, where they can benefit from the stability of Clearstream as well as from the liquidity, debt and the IT infrastructure that 360T can offer and that is leading, then, on the client side, to operational efficiency but as well also to cost efficiencies, and we on Clearstream and 360T side, we can benefit from internal synergies.

Speaker 1:

And Christian, what's happening on the central bank side of this? Because there's always a central bank angle that we discuss. We know that obviously they play a key role in managing money market liquidity, making cash available for repos and those sorts of things. So tell me, where does the central bank play into this? Is the changing environment out there having a big effect on monetary policy? Are tariffs changing things, or is there another angle we should be looking at?

Speaker 2:

Well, there's lots to pick in that question, but I would like to take it from the perspective of monetary policy first and I think monetary policy, but also what we do in our business repo and forex and compare the two and then make the link to what's going on. Currently, I think 60% of the world trade is still settled in dollars. So US banks are net lenders of dollars global, systemically important banks of the US and the borrowers are in the UK, the UK-based banks and the Eurozone-based banks. Now, if the bank wants to borrow dollars, they can do a repo and that has an impact on the balance sheet. So they actually finance securities, they sell collateral, get the dollar and then they have a term transaction. Okay, but it hits their balance sheet. The alternative is to do forex if you want to borrow a dollar. So you sell yen and you get a dollar.

Speaker 2:

And that's an interesting finding by the European Central Bank. I attended the European Central Bank Money Market Conference last year in November and there was a presentation, a paper, by an economist who showed that banks are moving out of repos at quarter end when they have to report for regulatory purposes what's on their balance sheet, and they move into Forex transactions at the premium. So they pay more in the forex to get the us dollar than they can get the dollar when they do a repo. And that's a little bit the macro picture which which we see. And this is why it's interesting for us to team up with uh 360p, who's uh, you know, a platform for forex, and also with with lars, who's obviously looking at automating some of the you know, collateral management, quote settlement products to Forex transactions.

Speaker 1:

But the bigger picture is that, and I think that's what I see from that perspective- Now we can touch later on, you know, foreign reserves, asset management, because that's the asset management arm of the central banks that typically invest in foreign reserves, and there, yeah, there's the ongoing sort of developments. It's like every day we seem to read a new story about automation, about the use of AI in trading venues or in, you know, platforms and infrastructure. I mean, Carlo and Lars, is automation and AI playing a big role in the way you're thinking about product development right now?

Speaker 3:

I mean there are two dimensions to it. Number one does it influence what we do today as 360T, as a trading venue where participants about 3,000 participants trade 150 billion euros a day equivalent? It changes how we do things, but it doesn't change what we do. So for us, as a platform, ai has influence on our operational business, not to the effect what we do. This is different for our customer base.

Speaker 3:

On our customer side it's different because they influence the pricing, they steal the pricing, what liquidity they put out there, how they do the hedges where they think they can make money. They embed AI a lot to find a hypnosis hypothesis on in what they should invest and what currencies they see involved in the next second, the next minute, in the next day. So it influences the behavior of our customers and their decision making process significantly and that's why, particularly also the non-banked LPs which are technically savvy and people like XTX, I think, bought thousands of NVIDIA chips, whereby JP Morgan has maybe lesser than these guys. So it plays a big role there. It doesn't so much in our business in what we do right now. It plays a big role there. It doesn't so much in our business in what we do right now.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, ai, I think, is fundamentally important for Clearstream. Clearstream is using AI in-house for preparing presentations, but as well also, of course, to analyze data, but also, ultimately, to produce and to develop smart solutions for our clients. One example would be, for example, the asset liability analyzer that we introduced just beginning of this year. This is a data-driven tool where we are allowing clients to monitor their historical credit utilization, and this allows them to better understand how they can optimize their cash and credit positions in order then to improve their security settlement flows. So this is, I would say, a clear example where we can help clients with data, as well as also AI solution.

Speaker 1:

And Christian, can you give us an update on the digital euro or the digital anything? I mean, we did a show now two years ago about central bank issued digital currencies. We've talked about it every season. We haven't mentioned it yet in season five. So I mean, tell us, is that going to be the big sort of tech news that comes out of the public sector this year? We know there's been experiments. We know it all works. There's a wholesale solution out there. Tell us, are we actually going to get a digital anything anytime soon?

Speaker 2:

Well, andrew, I think central bank digital currency is a topic which is a bit out. I think there's not many central banks that moved into that. Not many central banks that moved into that. There is a topic about, yes, digital currency, which are not necessarily DLT and blockchain. I mean, we all know about the digital yuan in China, but I mean, when it comes to stable coins, it's obviously still a big debate.

Speaker 2:

I believe that there are some projects there which are moving to get an alternative to the SWIFT payment network, but so far I think it has not emerged on the central bank side. But that doesn't mean that there's not something maybe coming, and we know that Hong Kong, saudi Arabia, thailand they are working on digital payment systems. There's countries that have moved onto digital currency. As I said, china, but also a saudi arabia is on digital currencies, so there is local systems in in countries, but when it comes to cross-border, it's still an issue, so I think it's not solved okay, well, although that might not seem like great news if you're urgently waiting for your digital euros to arrive in your email inbox.

Speaker 1:

But don't worry, because of course, there's always the world of tokens, digital assets and crypto to keep us busy, and they certainly have an impact in the world of Forex. Carlo, you are a MyCar regulated spot crypto trading venue, for example, um, which puts you in a great position. And, of course, earlier this year, uh, the clear stream, deutsche bourse has started, uh, their sort of crypto custody services as well, so there is a lot of change coming, isn't there in that space?

Speaker 3:

I mean, give us an update on that crypto situation, carlo I mean on the fx side it's relatively matured, um, and yes, we had these low latency players that get a certain chunk of the business, but not all of it. Um, and I think everybody finds this liquidity liquidity depending on credit facilities, time criticality, etc. On the crypto side, the market is not as efficient as of yet. There is a huge discrepancy between the crypto native world, between the platforms that are catering retail customers and do back-to-back trades with the market makers, such as non-bank LPs, and, on the other hand side, the TradFi world, which so far really did not enter this crypto trading world at scale yet.

Speaker 3:

This will probably happen now, sooner than later, given that the administration, particularly in the US, has created clear frameworks with the Genius Act, the Stable Act and more to come on which basis this could take place, which gives also more clarity to the banks what they can do and what they come, on which basis this could take place, which gives also more clarity to the banks what they can do and what they can't do. So we expect that this market, which is still how can I say a market of a certain group of participants, becomes also wider spread into the traditional finance industry going forward, and this is what we are preparing for right. So, because our customers are naturally the institutionals of this world and not retail customers. If anything, it's maybe in a B2B2C context that we then see implicitly aggregated retail flow, and so we are expecting that the institutional side and threat space will now start to pick up significantly over the course of the next 24 to 36 months in that space.

Speaker 1:

Well, of course, that is a perfect time to come back to you, lars. Let's take us through the new liquidity toolbox and also crypto custody. This was big news earlier in the year when that came out I think it was April. Take us through the latest developments there.

Speaker 4:

Sure, I think I can briefly touch on the toolbox that you mentioned. Right, but I will not go into the details because I think otherwise it will be too lengthy. But, toolbox wise, what we have been building out over the last years, we are covering actually four pillars it's credit, it's cash, fx and data. On the credit side, we offer secured intraday credit lines so clients provide us with liquid assets and we provide them credit lines against it to support their them with liquidity to cover gaps on their side and support them with during times when they have peak settlement activity. That's one thing. On the cash side, we offer multi-currency cash accounts linked to securities settlement accounts and this enables clients to do easy reconciliation on their side. They can consolidate their cash positions. And what our focus on the cash side is that we are building out is we want to introduce event-based cash sweep solutions for our clients to internal and external accounts. On the FX side I mean I mentioned that in the introduction we are having here already built out quite a stable solution service. We are covering case-by-case FX, spots, fx for our clients. We also have an FX auto FX solution in place for income proceeds and fees. So if a client has an income event in foreign currency, you can automatically convert this into their home currency. What we are now focusing on and that's what I said earlier with 360T is building out the AutoFX solution, and we are coming with an AutoFX solution that is linked to security settlement flows of clients. Today already we can do T plus 2 FX, which is the default FX.

Speaker 4:

Obviously, andrew, you mentioned T plus 1 is something that we can do. Indeed, we can do it. Since last year I mean since US moved the settlement cycle to T plus 1, we have also enabled quite a number of currencies, including some more exotic ones like Thai baht, indonesian rupiah and Malaysian ringgit, to T plus one. We are going to onboard more currencies to T plus one, but in the long run, we are looking to enable T plus zero, and there I think this will be a game change of clients in combination with the multi-currency cash account offering. On the data side, I touched based on that shortly with the asset liability analyzer solution. We also offer intraday and end ofof-day cache forecasting solutions through our exact web services, and this is kind of about it, I would say Focuses. So what I say is automation, certainly on our side, and then with the latest trends on T plus one and T plus zero, helping our clients with sufficient cash solutions in order to bridge the gap and being able to settle efficiently their core activity.

Speaker 1:

So let's bring all this together as we start to tie our threads. Looking a little bit towards the future, carlo, I want to come back to you. So there's obviously crypto custody services coming on stream. Lars has just said we're sort of edging closer to this idea of linking foreign exchange and securities flows together in real time. We know that settlement cycles are going to be causing issues because obviously T plus one for securities is fine, but t plus one doesn't always make sense, uh, when it comes to foreign exchanges, depending on when the trade is done in the day, and I think a lot of people might find there are challenges when it comes to even doing that with securities, let alone with fx. So I mean, where does 360t and your new 3dx digital exchange fit into that sort of landscape within the DB? For a market participant who's got their cash and assets in custody with Clearstream, you become the natural sort of FX partner for them.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, in the world today most currencies are still traded at T plus two. So if the security settles T plus one and you in the later afternoon you trade Aussie dollar, yen or Kiwi, there is a gap where somebody takes a risk for additional day when the security already settles and the currency doesn't, additional day when the security already settles and the currency doesn't In the T plus zero world when it comes. I mean, if you think the whole world further and we talk it on a DLT basis, then we don't have the distinction between the custody cycle with subcustodiansds as such in the today's world um, and a payment cycle which is completely independent from nostril accounts etc, central bank accounts etc. But you only have an asset swap on the drt right. So it's a. It's a harmonized technology for payments and assets at the same time which then then allows instant settlement if required, or at least on a batch or on a net basis on a day end, and so on and so on. So if the world really wants to go into this level of efficiency, including intraday repo trading and so on and so on, then it required this technology shift to make that fully efficient.

Speaker 3:

Between now and then I think the world is optimizing um and in the framework of the existing technologies and clearstream can do that, because it's not that you need a dlt to do something instantly. You can still do it on a binary version on a computer. With regards to the currencies, as always in other currencies involved, so far you can do T plus zero trades, which are forward trades technically because they deviate from the spot date. T plus two. But to settle intraday is not easy, but after the cutoff time. So we have to see how we harmonize the settlement windows of the securities with the settlement windows of the um of the currencies. But even here the combination of 360t and and and clear stream um can offer customers customers a congruent settlement, given that they have multi-currency accounts. And this is probably the future that we allow and enable the customers for congruent settlement of currencies and securities at any given point in time, if necessary. T plus zero.

Speaker 4:

What we see is certainly that cash management solutions are required to become smarter and also digital, and we are looking to automate, give automated solutions and also see how we can integrate FX solutions and real-time credit solutions within that. Right Now, when thinking about offering secured intraday credit, for example I mentioned that earlier that this is part of our toolbox we're offering that against highly qualifying liquid assets, like government bonds, for example. Who knows, I mean at some point we might have digital currencies to manage and then also we could provide credit against liquid asset classes like stable coins, right, of course, provided, of course, that this is all covered from a risk management perspective and also regulators support that. But for now, I mean our focus remains on providing a stable infrastructure to our clients and this is where we are focusing on. But we are certainly going with the trend and discovering, exploring where the market is going.

Speaker 1:

Okay, now you know we love our crystal ball questions on the show. Sadly, that is the end of the show. We can't go without having a look at the next year, 18 months, and try and predict what we're going to be talking about the next time. We all meet up here on the GFF to talk about liquidity and Forex, and during our sort of you know planning call for this, we did come up with a new phrase. It's not just a crystal ball. We're going to knock on the bush and see if a rabbit runs out, which thank you to Carlo for that. I think that one will probably stick as a new catchphrase on the show. So, okay, let's knock the bush and guys, what do you think? What are the rabbits that are going to run out, you think, over the next year, carlo, starting with you?

Speaker 3:

I mean crypto for insties is definitely a topic, also coming from the Synergy point of view. Crypto trading will and is in many banks in and around the FX trading activity because the runtime, behavior 24 hours etc is very similar to the foreign exchange market. The other topic is the interbank swap market, because at the moment it's still very offline, yet on the phone it's a broker market to a degree. So probably with this increased instancy and also credit risk associated to this and costs to it, this will probably more getting more digital over the course of the next two years and we have a good offering for that. I think the leading offering for this integrated services. I always say fx is everywhere, so um, also integrated fx services within clear stream for the people that have their s's there, that they have an integrated FX service is probably also of more imminent interest than it used to be when FX didn't move so much. So I think these are all three significant topics to our customer base where we can make a point and add value going forward individually and together.

Speaker 4:

I think for us, the most important thing will be the introduction of AutoFX linked to security settlement, so event-driven FX solutions. I think this will be the thing that we will look to introduce over the next 12 months, and then, of course, in combination with multi-currency accounts and then also having more focus on cash event-driven solutions. This is something where we see the future and I believe Clearstream is able to reshape here how institutions are operating globally going forward, if you ask me.

Speaker 2:

I think that shortening the settlement cycles and operating a multi-currency cross-border business like Clearstream has been doing. We have been in the market with some of these products for a long time and we now reap the benefits. I mean, if you look at this week's all-time highs in our GC Pudding product, since the European Central Bank has decreased, obviously, the facilities of lending money to the commercial banks, of lending money to the commercial banks, so money is again intra-banking and one of the platforms that is mostly used is the GC Pooling platform and we have had over a trillion outstandings in GC Pooling in July this year, which is an all-time high. So we can see that we are ready. We are ready, we just need to be, and I think we have been ahead of the curve and now, when things happen, we will be there. So I think we are well prepared.

Speaker 1:

Great, good, well, listen, thank you. Now, sadly, that is it. We have to draw it to a close. What does remain is for us to give a huge virtual studio. Thank you to our special guests, who are in no particular order. We don't preference people on this show we're going to start. So a huge thank you to the head of liquidity solutions on the product management side there, someone who's celebrating his 10th year. So happy birthday, lars. A huge round of applause for Lars Janssen. Lars, thank you very much. Thank you, that's great. Thank you very much. And also a huge thanks to a man who's taken time off from holiday to join us here today, so that's an extra special round of applause we'll be dubbing on in the post-production suite for Carlo Colza. Carlo, who is, of course, founding partner at 360T and global head of FX and digital assets Deutsche Börse. Carlo, thank you for joining us.

Speaker 3:

Thank you so much for the interesting discussion.

Speaker 1:

That's great, thank you, okay. So all that remains is for us to say do join us. On the next GFF podcast, we will be joined by the European Stability Mechanism. Yes, I Okay. So all that remains is for us to say do join us. On the next GFF podcast, we will be joined by the European Stability Mechanism. Yes, I'm giving a preview now. That's going to be an exciting one, so do join us for that. I won't say any more now, apart from to give a huge thank you to the man without whom there would be no show. Very much the cash to my tango. Little joke there for Alexander Roque, if you're listening. A big round of applause to Mr Christian Rossler.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, Andrew.

Speaker 1:

Okay, make sure you join us on our LinkedIn channel that is linkedincom slash company slash Clearstream, where you can network with Lars and network with Carlo and, of course, with Christian and myself, and find out all about what's going to be coming up. We have a year of interesting things happening, obviously because it's the GFF 30th anniversary next year. Lots of announcements coming out, lots of things to watch. Do join us on our LinkedIn channel and, in the meantime, from me, andrew Keith Walker, have a good month and we'll see you next month. Bye-bye and don't forget. This show is brought to you by Clearstream Banking, one of the main sponsors of the GFF Summit in Luxembourg every year. It features members of the Clearstream team and special guests offering their personal opinions, not the opinions of Clearstream as an organization. There's no representation made as to the accuracy or completeness of information in this podcast in order to be taken as any legal, tax or other professional advice. Bye-bye.