Risk is inherent in investing, and minimizing that risk is a common\u00a0goal for money managers. MFS Investment Management\u00ae, a global asset management firm based in Boston, Massachusetts, manages more than $410 billion in assets for clients worldwide. When\u00a0operating at the level of MFS, any trading error can have major,\u00a0costly consequences.<\/p>\n
MFS created its Global Portfolio Modeler (GPM) application to help\u00a0mitigate investment, operational, and technological risk. Investment and operations teams use GPM to rapidly generate models based on proprietary algorithms, assess risk, run compliance, and generate\u00a0program trades for globally managed portfolios. But the original version of the application, built on a relational database, was not\u00a0fast or scalable enough to keep pace with the organization\u2019s growth,\u00a0the increasing speed of trading, and the mounting complexity of\u00a0portfolios and regulations. So MFS decided to create a new version.<\/p>\n
Manuel Delgado, Vice President of Investment Systems Software Development at MFS, observes that, \u201cone of the principal objectives when deciding to revise GPM was to integrate a database that would\u00a0allow for consistent levels of high performance coupled with a large\u00a0degree of scalability.\u201d MFS chose InterSystems data platform.<\/p>\n
A meeting with InterSystems, and the promise of in-memory database speed with the reliability of automatic data persistence, led to a proof-of-concept project using the InterSystems database and Microsoft\u2019s .NET programming framework. The project focused on the compliance engine inside GPM. \u201cThe compliance engine is central to the investment process, and was running within our relational database,\u201d explains Delgado. Running any given model can result in thousands of complex rules being checked simultaneously and, even with tuning, performance on the relational database was lackluster and problematic. The proof-of-concept with InterSystems exceeded expectations for performance.<\/p>\n
The switch has enabled MFS to reach its goals for performance, reliability, application availability, scalability, and risk reduction. GPM has been remarkably stable with minimal support and more efficient use of development resources. \u201cI really enjoy the fact that now I never hear a word from users about performance problems in GPM,\u201d says Delgado.<\/p>\n
The speed of GPM and its core risk algorithms gives portfolio specialists immediate feedback on risk and other significant metrics during the investment decision-making process. \u201cWe have seen a significant improvement in our time-to-market, from model instruction through compliance clearance to execution, since the change to InterSystems database technology,\u201d says Delgado. \u201cMore importantly, we have seen a significant reduction of investment and operational risk.\u201d<\/p>\n
All InterSystems data platform products combine a highly efficient multi-dimensional data store that simultaneously supports object and relational data access. Developers benefit from having a range of development technologies to choose from, including InterSystems ObjectScript, C++, .NET, and Java, with flexible data navigation. \u201cThe whole team enjoyed being able to work with objects in .NET and just persist those objects without mapping,\u201d notes Delgado.<\/p>\n
Downtime in financial services may mean a significant loss of revenue. So MFS uses the high availability features of InterSystems technology to ensure that if there is a problem, work can continue uninterrupted. \u201cRelational databases have their deficiencies in supporting data-rich, highly computational, transactional applications, which can lead to outages or significant delays,\u201d explains Delgado. \u201cThe data model offered by InterSystems is well suited for this type of environment. Using the InterSystems data platform we have had a perfect record of availability with GPM.\u201d<\/p>\n
Switching from a \u201ctraditional\u201d database has given one of MFS\u2019s key applications the speed, reliability, and scalability needed to carry the organization forward for many years. InterSystems data platform has proven to be a better solution for:<\/p>\n
\u201cGPM is a vital application for MFS. Looking at the order volume generated by the application since its inception, GPM has proven to be a remarkable success,\u201d says Delgado. \u201cGPM and InterSystems technology have helped us clearly mitigate the risk of trading errors on the investment and operational sides of the business.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Switch From Relational Database to InterSystems Data Platform Accommodates Growth Risk is inherent in investing, and minimizing that risk is a common\u00a0goal for money managers. MFS Investment Management\u00ae, a global asset management firm based in Boston, Massachusetts, manages more than $410 billion in assets for clients worldwide. When\u00a0operating at the level of MFS, any trading […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2408,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/ec-projects.co.uk\/intersystems-uki\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/performance.jpg","yoast_head":"\n