by Sachin Murdeshwar

Mumbai: Association of National Exchange Members of India (ANMI), India’s largest pan-India body of over 900 exchange brokers and members, unveiled the first-ever StockTech Survey Report on technology needs and trends in the country’s broking industry.

The StockTech Survey report was launched at ANMI’s StockTech 2019 – India’s biggest symposium and expo on transformative innovations and emerging technologies shaping our Financial Markets and broking industry– held at the BSE Convention Hall on December 6th, 2019.

The StockTech survey report includes responses from ANMI members representing the top names in the broking industry. The survey throws up interesting insights into the current practices of the broking industry in terms of their technology preparedness as well as their views and plans for future technology needs.

The survey found that almost 86% of brokers view technology as an important criterion for their businesses by 2020. It also showed that 79% of brokers were currently active investors in technology. However, the survey revealed that despite a large number of brokers facing some technology-related setbacks over the last two years, most still didn’t have a fixed annual budget earmarked as technology expenditure. More than 72% respondents said their technology spend was ‘as and when required’. This indicates the lack of preparedness among the broking industry players for dealing with the challenges of an ever-changing technology landscape in the industry and their need to keep pace with technology developments around the world.

The survey also found that besides front-office and back-office software, the other technology software that most brokers – around 58% – would invest in 2020 would be the Algos, which indicates precision and speed in execution of trades will continue to be the focus areas for brokers even as broking services migrate towards automation and DIY models.

According to Mr. Ashishkumar Chauhan, MD & CEO, BSE, “Stocktech is organised keeping in mind the ever increasing need of the stock brokers to keep abreast with the latest technology available in the market to augment their businesses. The Indian capital market and stock broking space is at a transformative juncture with a lot of emphasis on safe, responsive, cost effective and dynamic stock broking. The rapid expansion of networks and technologies has led to the emergence of cybercrime due to which it has become important for firms to counter likely cyber threats and invest in technological infrastructure for enhanced performance and cybersecurity.”

According to Mr. Kamlesh Shroff (ANMI CHAIRMAN WIRC)“, “Technology has played a key role in the transformation of India’s broking landscape. It’ll continue to play a significant role in determining the competitiveness among the industry players in terms of costs, speed and ease of service, widening reach as well as providing personalised solutions for meeting specific customer requirements. The StockTech Survey provides a glimpse of the current and future technology needs of the broking industry and the parameters they’ll need to improve on for keeping pace with the expected growth in financial market services. The Stock Tech Annual symposium, on the other hand, provides an opportunity for all participants of the broking industry to update their technology to be able to stay competitive and ahead of the curve.”

The StockTech annual marquee show is India’s largest gathering of the entire financial market technology ecosystem. It was attended by 45 top fin-tech exhibitors and vendors, 300 stockbrokers, and 75% of major industry stakeholders and influencers.  This symposium provides an opportunity for leading technology players operating in this segment to showcase their innovations and global expertise in meeting the requirements of India’s broking industry.