Ifyou want to stay in this business
you have to join the ECNsJ
Martin Tunstall:
currency pairs, we support limit orders and in the money
markets we support loans and deposits in 22 currencies. Our
platforms are connected to all the major ECNs - Bloomberg,
Tradeweb, Integral, FXall, Currenex and 360T. GFM still has a
single bank portal, internally known as Rocket (Rabobank
One ClicK Electronic Trading) for internal and external use
by professional traders and sales. We also service TransAct
(FX, MM and Fiduciary), which supports our member banks,
large corporates and some SMEs in the Netherlands. With
eMarkets we can work in real-time, so now Rl is ranked in the
top-tier by the ECNs and our automated systems enable Rl to
compete effectively and win its fair share of foreign exchange
business for the cliënt market segment that we quote. In
foreign exchange we are currently handling some EUR 30
billion worth of quotes every day and we are trading almost
10 percent of that. In Money Markets we handle EUR 1.2 billion
in daily quotes, of which half is traded. We are constantiy
switching clients over to our platforms and volumes are
increasing as we continually engage with our customers to
improve the services we provide."
The new middlemen have a major effect on the visibility of
Rabobank. For most large corporates, single bank portals are
no longer the first port of call for foreign exchange. The same
is happening and will continue to happen in other market
segments. Van Daatselaar points to large corporate payment
transactions that are being moved to Swift. Van Daatselaar and
Tunstali, however, agree that there is still demand for single
banks solutions such as Rocket, and dedicated portals such as
TransAct in the Netherlands that bundie relevant information
for clients in specific market segments. Rabobank would not
like to see mid-cap companies moving to sheer price-oriented
multibank environments too quickly. ECNs are about pricing
only whereas single bank solutions can deliver the same
pricing but with the bank s knowledge and expertise included
to make better transaction decisions. Rabobank pays a lot of
attention to the relationship, service, advice and duty of care.
This goes much further than just competing on price. "But if
we have to, we can provide very tough competition on price."
Van Daatselaar sees a future role for single bank portals
in wholesale, provided the information and services are
customised. "Our approach within the corporate segment is
that we are eliminating the silos. We are bringing all wholesale
products and services together on our portal and are working
now on customising our services. Once we have reached that
level, we could add analytical capacities to give our clients
new insights. Suppose on our retail portal you could get
easy-to-understand analysis of your payments, investment
and your mortgage, like brokers do for investments. Instead
of fïnding the information yourself, the bank would present
the insight. For this, the different distribution channels - face
to face versus online - would have to be integrated as well:
relationship managers who explain the ciient's financial
position, risk exposures and strategie plans. This would then
be translated into a tailored offering online, showing the
clients everything we can offer on their liquidity forecast,
a particular currency exposure or export domain including
transaction capabilities. GFM eCommerce cooperates with
Financial Logistics on creating these unique selling points."
There are opportunities to make Rabobank really stand out with
its online wholesale offering. Clients are increasingly getting used
to having access to their bank any time, anywhere. And a major
question is: how can e-commerce contribute to a strategy that
aims to play a leading role in Food and Agribusiness?
"The online distribution channel is a great way to bring
different business lines to the table to talk about client-centric
offerings," confirms Van Daatselaar. "We have done that with
Rabobank's wholesale research units, which are now all
distributing their research via the login section of Rabo
TransAct. And no longer with their own department names
like FAR, FMR, KEO, IKT, but Food Agri, Financial Markets,
Global Economics and Sector research instead. All on one
page; all under one search button. By extending that way of
working with other units, we can really make a difference as
a bank, because most banks are struggling with this."
ISSUE 26
Rl WORLD
