Charles River IMS vs. FloQast

If your are large asset management company focused mostly on interest rate products and you are large institutional trader your way is the use of Charles River Portfolio Management & Risk Analytics account which is most reputable custodian institution which offers superior tool for bonds trading - Charles River IMS. Charles River Portfolio Management & Risk Analytics is focused on large bond traders, so is not offered for small hedge funds. It is not appropriate if you are small account holder and focused more on stock market offerings, margin trading and less focused on custodian reputation. There is no separate risk module for trading group risk management.

Incentivized

I used another vendor for close management before, and comparing the two, FloQast is easier to use and the site navigation is much easier. The looks and feels of the site are more engaging and pleasant. As mentioned before in the previous question, their Journal Entry posting functionality is not suited for a company with multiple entities since it only allows you to book an entry when debits and credits are hitting the same entity

Incentivized

• Focused on bonds
• Risk approache based on counterparties risk measurement
• Buid in scenario strategies and testing
• CDS are available for trading (exlusive offering)
• Portfolio construction
• Yield analytics
• Exotics: SWAPs, SWAPtions
• Sophisticated options analytics
• Currency forwards (exclusive offering)

Incentivized

• Provides a clear status of the month end close.
• Allows us to analyze tasks by team member and reassign as needed.
• It syncs with our ERP Netsuite to ensure balance sheet reconciliations can be tied out directly.
• It also connects with Slack to notify users of key deadlines and changes in review status for team tasks.

Incentivized

• Equities - microstructure to consider detection of iceberg orders
• Build in algos for large trades execution
• Corporate or Banking level platform - not focused on mid sized business
• SAP connectivity
• Only Charles River Portfolio Management & Risk Analytics accounts
• No trading group accounts capabilities
• Needs arbitrage trading algo: spread, statistical, merger for stocks

Incentivized

• A setting to allow for attachments to automatically be opened within the app (Adobe, Excel, etc.) rather than as a separate tab in the browser
• Some of our tasks are quarterly or annual so assigning a very specific date would be helpful
• Eliminate the need of "closing" review notes. Once we change the status to Resolved, that should be sufficient. Make Resolved and Closed one and the same

Incentivized

It has proven to enhance our procedures with closing. It is an effective tool that I would recommend to create a more efficient closing procedure and get the team more aligned. It increases the accountability among the staff and helps to keep us on task and on time. It is easy to sign into and has reminder emails for tasks that are coming up or late.

Incentivized

FloQast is incredibly intuitive and easy to use. The only reason I don't give it a 10 is that the Flux Analysis feature is not great in terms of getting the information into the system. Once it's in, fantastic! But some work is needed

We have only noticed a slight slow down in accessing FloQast on a couple of occasions (near the beginning of a month when many people were likely trying to get online to close their books). The issue has always resolved itself with three to five minutes, so it's never been a hinderance.

FloQast's performance is great. The pages always load quickly, and reports are completed fast! I've never noticed any slowdown in our ERP from the interface with FloQast.

They are rapid in their response. If they can't immediately offer a solution, they continue to keep in contact with you to let you know where they are in resolving your issues. The staff is friendly & speaks to you in layman's terms, not so high-tech that you can't understand

Incentivized

The FloQast team members are just so personable. FloQast has clearly done a great job hiring people who are not just good at what they do, but are also fun to work with! They have placed people in the right roles and the customer benefits from this. I have enjoyed every opportunity I've had to work with a FloQast team member on training.

The online training is good. But like all online, pre-recorded training, it is never quite as good as in-person or live training where one can ask questions or get clarification. That said, FloQast has an extensive training library and most of the time, if one finds they need help on a topic, it can be answered by going to the online training and watching appropriate recording.

Implementation occured before I started with the company (but despite the instruction to skip the question if I did not participate, the site required I put in a rating in order to move on to the next page)

Charles River Portfolio Management & Risk Analytics is a state of the art company which owns state of the art products Charles River Portfolio Management & Risk Analytics. If you are considering long term value, capital preservation strategy and pension funds management that is the right choice if holdien one account versus several to get systematic diversification. You can run even department of banks treasury with use of Charles River Portfolio Management & Risk Analytics. So good but focused on large investors needs and diversification focus.

Incentivized

At the time we picked FloQast, they were the most cost effective and easiest tool to use. Fast forward a little bit, and Numeric has come to market. I really lie Numeric to be honest and feel that their pricing is better and for that lower pricing, they include more functions. However, we continued with FloQast for ease of continuity and my team is time strapped. What that said, FloQast is great - nothing wrong with it other than it could be cheaper.

Incentivized

I had no control over the contract

Incentivized

We started using it with one client/customer and now use it with fourteen entities and plan to add two more in the next couple of months. It has made it possible to grow our business without hiring additional personnel. We can do more work with the same number of people

• Neutral. We are in system migration process.
• We expect to get our P&L less volatile (+/- 5%). More international bonds in a mix
• Top custodian is our first priority

Incentivized

• Floqast has reduced our closing schedule by roughly 15-20% of the time it took us beforehand.
• The product has been very beneficial for us during audit time when we can easily demonstrate our control workflows on reconciliation and task approvals.
• I can update our CFO at any point in time how we are trending towards close and can coordinate with finance as to the moment journal entries have been completed

Incentivized