Post-trade Automation 2025

Leveraging Industry Initiatives to Achieve Cross-Asset Efficiencies

The post-trade landscape in capital markets is undergoing fundamental transformation, driven by regulatory deadlines, technological advances and changing market structures. Decades of fragmented infrastructure and siloed operations, rooted in asset-class-specific legacy systems, have created inefficiencies in communication, reconciliation and data integrity across trading entities.

Published on: 20 Jun, 2025somdn_product_page

Description

This report identifies industry players, such as Broadridge and Bloomberg, as instrumental in advancing multi-asset post-trade automation. The transition to T+1 in the US showed measurable improvements in STP, trade fail rates and settlement finality, particularly in derivatives and fixed income, although there were higher costs for boutique and mid-tier firms. The report describes a market evolving toward near-continuous trading and instantaneous settlement, demanding infrastructure that is resilient, automated and capable of handling tokenised and traditional assets alike.

Key Takeaways

  • Legacy systems remain a major hurdle due to siloed architecture and duplicated messaging across asset classes.
  • T+1 settlement in the US is a proving ground, with positive gains in STP and fail rates, and it provides useful lessons for institutions currently planning for the adoption of T+1 in the EU and UK in 2027.
  • 24/7 trading is on the rise driven by digital asset markets, which are also reshaping custody settlement models and demand for DLT-based platforms.
  • The adoption of ISO 20022, which is rising in securities processing, will be crucial for international cross-market interoperability, real-time processing and end-to-end automation.

Table of Contents

  • Executive Summary 
  • 1.0 Introduction
  • 2.0 The Current Situation and its Challenges
    • 2.1 Breaking Down the Silos
  • 3.0 Imperatives Driving Change in the Post-Trade Environment
    • 3.1. Moving Towards 24/7 Trading Hours
    • 3.2 Accelerated Settlement: to T+1 & Beyond
    • 3.3 The Irresistible Rise of Digital Assets
  • 4.0 Post-trade Interaction in the Wider Market Ecosystem
    • 4.1 Message Standards are Key to Full Post-trade Automation
    • 4.2 The Role of Financial Market Infrastructures & Vendors
  • 5.0 Table of Figures

Data and Figures


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