Weekly Global News Wrap Up: Barclays unveils new electronic trading platform; South African banks strengthen defense against armed robberies

And UniCredit Bank sells 17% stake in online broker FinecoBank.

From Bloomberg:

Barclays is betting on a new electronic trading platform to boost returns at its investment bank just as clients are expected to increase trading via machines.

The British bank is combining equities with fixed income, currencies and futures on the revamped BARX platform, according to Naseer Al-Khudairi, the firm’s markets head of global electronic trading who was hired from Credit Suisse Group AG last year. The firm has also doubled its equities team of quants over the past 18 months as it built out a new algorithmic offering for its equities operation.

From Bloomberg:

To combat the thugs taking advantage of the gridlock, businesses are meeting weekly with city officials and metropolitan police who direct traffic and monitor crime hotspots. Undercover cops are also keeping watch, whilst the likes of Absa Group. and FirstRand’s First National Bank provide shuttle services for staff, let employees work from home, come in during off-peak times or use satellite offices.

“Our ops center reports regularly on the situation just to check it’s business as usual,” Absa’s acting chief executive officer, Rene van Wyk, said. When the lender put more security in place, perpetrators would move further along, looking for weak spots, he said.

From Reuters: 

Italy’s biggest bank UniCredit on Tuesday launched the sale of a 17% stake in online brokerage business FinecoBank as part of efforts to bolster the group’s financial strength.

UniCredit stands to make a big capital gain on the placing of just under half its holding in Fineco. UniCredit’s total stake of 35.35% has a market value of $2.7 (EUR2.4b) and a book value of $1.09t (EUR981m).