Best of the Hedge IT Blog: 2016’s Most Popular Financial Technology Articles

By Lauren Zdanis | Thursday, December 29th, 2016

2017 is quickly approaching and so are a plethora of new financial technology and operations articles here on Hedge IT. As we wrap up 2016, let’s take a look back and share some of our readers’ favorite articles from this past year.

How to Launch a Hedge Fund: Cap Intro, Legal & Tech Tips

Tips for launching a hedge fund are always popular on Hedge IT, and 2016 was no different. Earlier this year, Eze hosted a webinar featuring speakers Paul Schultz from Wells Fargo, Michael Mavrides from Proskauer Rose LLP, and Bob Guilbert from Eze Castle Integration. A few key takeaways from the 1-hour event include:

Understand that investors will expect enterprise-grade technology built in from Day 1.
Remember the advantages of the cloud: a predictable cost, flexibility and scalability (“tech on demand”), enterprise security, and professional management and monitoring.
Compare both the benefits and disadvantages of a “master fund” versus a “side-by-side” structure (e.g. the master fund allows for one set of books and trades, while the side-by-side structure allows for more tax flexibility)
Show investors that you have a 3+ year budget for working capital without any performance fees.

Click here to watch the webcast in its entirety.

Phishing Red Flags Employees Must Know

Education still remains key to understanding and preventing phishing scams. Falling prey to common tricks such as downloading a malicious virus or – more seriously – completing a fraudulent wire transfer can have troubling professional, financial and reputational consequences for both the employee and the firm. Phishing attempts can occur via email, phone, instant message, SMS or social media. Here are a few tips to look out for to avoid these scams:

Check the sender email address as well as “to” and “cc” fields
Is it personalized? Be wary of generic greetings
Improper spelling and grammar can be giveaways as well
An overwhelming sense of urgency requesting personal information
Click only on the links that you are expecting, and check to make sure they are directing you to the correct place (same goes for attachments).
Suspicious emails from trusted sources can happen. If your friend/colleague sends a strange message, their account may have been attacked.

What Hedge Fund Tech Can Learn from the Delta Airlines IT Outage

Earlier this year, Delta Airlines suffered an outage that impacted thousands of flights. Delta’s Chief Operating Officer Gil West explained that “a critical power control module at [Delta’s] Technology Command Center malfunctioned, causing a surge to the transformer and a loss of power. The universal power was stabilized and power was restored quickly. But when this happened, critical systems and network equipment didn’t switch over to backups. Other systems did. [As a result, Delta saw] instability in these systems.”

This incident shone light on the importance of data backups and contingency planning. Some key takeaways that hedge funds can learn from Delta’s mistakes include:

Outdated technology can hurt companies
Cloud computing is inevitable
Disaster recovery tests must be real and comprehensive
Security breaches or downtime can taint your reputation

Private Equity CTO Survey [Infographic]

Of course, we couldn’t have a “most popular article” compilation without including our 2016 Private Equity CTO Survey. The survey is filled with insights across four primary areas: business priorities, cybersecurity, outsourcing trends and the evolution of the private equity CTO. Some of the key findings include:

70% of private equity firms report their organizations have experienced 3 or more cybersecurity issues in the past 12 months
Nearly 90% of respondents identified cloud computing as a planned investment area, with respondents preferring private cloud solutions over the public cloud.
93% of survey respondents believe their firm’s CTO or top IT executive is becoming more important to their business

Download the full report here: www.eci.com/pesurvey or check out our handy infographic!