Newsletter: Q2, 2021

The Accelerated Growth Edition

Recent global economic outlooks have turned optimistic, backed by positive policy support and progress made on vaccine roll-out trends globally. Markets worldwide are on an upward move, and we see record levels of M&A and SPAC investments. Capital markets and private equity have gathered tremendous optimism and confidence as well.

Among the global trends, the war for talent and demand for our services have never been higher. Even with the positive sentiments and growth momentum, we still find some of our existing and prospective customers are unsure how data, research, analytics and reporting for the front office can play a pivotal role in accelerating business growth and driving innovation.

Gyanendra N Pati, Director, Global Head of Marketing

In focus

The rise of SPACs: Private equity’s new frontier		SPACs were hot in 2020 and are hotter now!


The special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) space is triggered not only by quantity but also by quality; hence, recent changes may support confidence in and continuity of this mechanism. Undoubtedly, it may become an additional exit route for private-equity firms.		SPACs have become a notable trend in the IPO world amid the pandemic. What is driving the increase in SPACs? What are the challenges they pose? What does the future hold for them?

Explore how we can support you on the SPAC sponsor journey, from IPO to de-SPAC, amid unprecedented macroeconomic conditions.

Exclusive and Original Insights from Acuity

We feature six of our recent trending articles below.

LatAm corporate bonds: Strong expectations for 2021 after a stellar 2020		LIBOR benchmark fallback provisions


Find how increased issuance activity in LatAm debt markets, coupled with widening yields, presents attractive investment opportunities for foreign participants seeking higher returns.		Since LIBOR is calculated from rates given by panel banks, if these panel banks do not give the rates, it would be impossible to calculate LIBOR. With LIBOR, financial market participants have gotten used to a term structure that may not be available for overnight rates such as the SOFR.


Internal carbon pricing: An emerging approach to building sustainable investment portfolios		Greenwashing: the hurdle for green lenders


Find more on how internal carbon pricing—coupled with other tools such as ESG ratings and industry analysis—can prove to be a useful measure in providing direction, helping investors and financiers weed out investments that do not fare well on environmental parameters and build more carbon-neutral portfolios in the long run.		Actions and initiatives to mitigate climate change triggered an alarm on greenwashing. Find out how problems are likely to arise with the new trends; greenwashing is one of them.


Trade allocation: Asset managers’ need for a robust compliance function		Scaling your real-time AML detection rules


The trade allocation compliance function is getting more visibility, as supervisory bodies have intensified their attempts to combat misconduct by firms in trade allocation practices. Read on to know more on the significance of compliance in trade allocation.		If your AML -detection platform flags a potentially fraudulent transaction only way after the event has occurred, it is probably not serving its purpose very well, is it? How do we design a platform that can be scaled for AML pattern detection in real time?

Trending solutions and digital applications

We continue to enhance our Business Excellence and Automation Tools (BEAT) applications and managed solutions suite to help your analysts and operational teams significantly improve turnaround times, accuracy and quality.

FolioSure: Portfolio monitoring for private equity and venture capital	TombstoneHub: Automated credentials builder for investment bank	BEAT AdInspect: Marketing compliance review tool



A fully customisable advanced managed solution for PE/VC portfolio monitoring. Achieve 30-40% cost savings and 50% shorter turnaround time for portfolio monitoring and LP reporting.	TombstoneHub streamlines and automates the creation of fully formatted tombstones or credential slides for investment bankers.	Our tool enables financial services firms to minimise risk, reduce costs, and increase efficiencies for their compliance review process.

In the news

Bloomberg: More evidence of how frothy SPACs can be	Global Finance: No more normal: Q&A with CEO Robert King	American Banker: Early CRE payoffs drive Bank OZK into new specialties

“We were fortunate to connect with clients on a deeper level and grow our business by offering market-leading services and technology solutions to new and existing clients. Global banks, asset managers and financial services companies sought assistance to transform their businesses, drive innovation and operate efficiently. Through our ability to provide quality services-even though the business moved to a work-from-home footing from March 2020-Acuity has been able to continue hiring talent and expand its reach in North America, Europe and Asia.”

- Robert King, Chief Executive Officer, Acuity Knowledge Partners

Podcast with Acuity’s head of Compliance


	ABOUT ACUITY KNOWLEDGE PARTNERS Acuity Knowledge Partners (Acuity), formerly part of Moody’s Corporation, is a leading provider of bespoke research, analytics, staffing and technology solutions to the financial services sector. Headquartered in London, Acuity Knowledge Partners has nearly two decades of experience in servicing over 350 clients by deploying its 3,200+ specialist workforce of analysts and delivery experts across its global delivery network. We provide our clients with unique assistance to innovate, implement transformation programmes, increase operational efficiency, and manage costs and improve their top lines. These services are supported by our proprietary suite of Business Excellence and Automation Tools (BEAT) that offer domain-specific contextual technology. Acuity Knowledge Partners is backed by Equistone Partners Europe, a leading private equity organisation that backs specialist growth businesses and management teams.

	US: +1.212.553.7778 +1.212.553.8916 \| UK: +44 207 550 4499 \| Hong Kong: +852 (972) 836-39 contact@acuitykp.com


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