Market data vendor Markit has launched a research management system that, among other things, allows the buyside to vote on and rank the quality of its brokers’ services, including research, execution services and capital commitment.
Buyside firms typically conduct "broker votes" periodically. This is a process in which a firm’s portfolio managers, analysts and traders qualitatively assess the value of the services provided by brokers and decide which firms’ services they want to buy.
With the new technology, the buyside can cast votes any time, said Sofia Rossato, head of Markit’s Research Manager system–they don’t have to wait until the end of the voting period. They can call up the results quarterly, semiannually and yearly. And the system also allows users to give more weight to the opinions of participants who play a more significant role in the decision-making process.
"You used to vote for broker performance by where you directed your trades," Rossato said. The sellside and other research providers all contribute information to the system. Markit pays nothing for the information. The buyside pays a per-user licensing fee.
The company’s Research Manager product is composed of three other parts: a directory of research providers; a management function that provides alerts and views into new content’ and a central calendar of corporate meetings, conferences and road shows.
(c) 2011 Traders Magazine and SourceMedia, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.tradersmagazine.com http://www.sourcemedia.com/
