1. Simplifying Complexity:
Rationalising and
decommissioning process
and technology
Top Ten Challenges for
Investment Banks 2015
05
SimplifyingComplexity:
Rationalisinganddecommissioning
processandtechnology

2. 05
Simplifying Complexity:
Rationalising and decommissioning
process and technology
The era of the full service offering generating mega profits
is over. With banks in the process of finding their niche, it
is necessary to determine an operating structure that best
supports this new strategy.
The industry is at a point of intersection.
Regulators are driving banks to rationalise
and, at the same time, cost pressures across
all business is intense. This requires banks to
become dismantlers, rather than creators,
of complexity. To do this banks should take
a firm-wide view of change, looking across
management structures, operations and
technology to shed the complexity made
redundant by shifting business focus.
Simplification imperatives
Internal landscapes are characterised by
legacy technologies and processes siloed by
asset class, product and geography.
Historically, executives often focused purely
on growth and disregarded the challenges of
simplifying operations. However, headwinds
in the current operating environment make
this position increasingly untenable.
Regulation
Regulation is driving rationalisation in two
ways. Firstly, capital requirements are
driving simplified business models, as the
increased cost of capital informs
participation decisions by Group. The
withdrawal of Goldman Sachs and JP
Morgan Chase from commodities and
metals emphasises that this rationalisation
impacts even players of scale.
Secondly, regulation is increasing the cost
of business and the need to rationalise
structures in businesses where banks
choose to remain, due to focus on
rationalised governance, reporting
structures and transparency. Dodd-Frank,
MiFID and EMIR requirements, for instance,
will push 90% of the market’s voice and
manual interactions to electronic platforms
and, by 2016, the move to electronic
trading venues is expected to cause sales
and trading losses of 9%, heightening the
need to rationalise the cost base. Though
e-trading spreads are cheaper, the
increased regulatory capital requirements
from margining may actually increase the
overall cost of trading.i
2
i Source: Deutsche Bank AG FS Report

3. 3
The dual running of systems during
transition will further increase costs,
emphasising the need to decommission
legacy systems effectively. Passing these
costs onto clients is not sustainable in an
increasingly competitive and lower-
returning market. Rather, rationalisation of
the cost base is required in order for banks
to remain competitive.
Downward pressure on headcount and
compensation is central to meeting
these cost pressures, and a regulatory
tailwind has emerged in the form of
CRD IV governance requirements.
Management structures remain
inconsistent, with minimal recruitment
in some and limited promotion in other
areas distorting the pyramid. The
authorities’ monitoring of internal
governance arrangements, according to
specific milestones, put simplifying
governance and headcount structures at
the forefront of senior-level decision
making. Withdrawal from certain
businesses will make rationalisation of
the headcount part of ongoing change
– but within remaining lines, the need
to meet renewed cost pressures and
regulatory governance requirements will
drive further rationalisation.
Technology
The move to electronic trading has been
noted – but initial efforts have
demonstrated the requirement for unified,
scalable technologies, rather than
solutions built onto existing architecture.
For example, 85% of listed futures and
options are now traded electronically, but
75% of banks’ buy-side clients suffer from
“data overload”, finding their bank’s
platform unnavigable as pricing,
counterparty information and execution
avenues are fed from different
departments.ii
The lingering short-termist approach is
demonstrated here by banks building on
existing business models rather than
focusing on client needs. More pressingly,
it is exposing banks to disruptive
technologies and platforms that are
tailored to client needs.
The rapid growth in market share of
private investment services, with scalable
platforms offering a front-to-back service,
has been impressive. Banks may baulk at
Figure 1: Revenue by Asset Class, Q2 2013 vs. Q2 2014 (Advisory vs. Equities vs. FICC), £bn
5.1
5.1
4.1
4.9
5.4
3.9
3.7
4.5
4.4
5.6
5.8
6.4
7.0
4.3
4.2
1.5
1.5
2.4
2.2
2014
2013
2014
2013
2014
2013
2014
2013
2014
2013
2014
2013
2014
2013
2014
2013
2014
2013
2014
2013
5.3
Bank of America
Barclays
Citi
Credit Suisse
Deutsche Bank
Goldman Sachs
JP Morgan
Morgan Stanley
RBS
UBS
• Advisory
• Equities
• FICC
47%
50%
60%
41%
55%
40%
54%
25%
18%
45%
63%
63%
36%
42%
58%
29%
17%
32%
22%
27%
26%
24%
32%
28%
33%
40%
31%
16%
21%
26%
22%
24%
26%
29%
the potential of market entrants in the
private investment space occupying their
market share, but Barclays Stockbrokers’
recent entry into the price war in
investment platforms is a harbinger of
future moves.
Achieving Simplification
Core competencies
As banks find their niche and differentiate
their offerings against their peers - as we
are beginning to see in Figure 1 - the
growth of cross-asset execution and
multi-asset portfolios will require unified
pricing, routing and drive automation.
UBS’ Neo platform is an instructive
example. Whilst accounting for incoming
structural changes – agency dealing in the
principal-focused fixed-income business is
supported, for example – it provides a view
across products. Encompassing a lateral
product view across global equities,
currencies and fixed income, it provides
coverage of the trade lifecycle with
counterparty eligibility, trading history,
central clearing methods and best
execution. Consolidating around core
capabilities, organisational change is
20%
24%
27%
13%
20%
16%
ii GreySpark
33%
38%
21%
29%
32%
18%
42%
18%
23%
46%
100%
100%
42%
53% Source: Accenture Research
56%
26%

4. 4
Figure 2: Non-interest expenses as a % of revenue
61
64
67
54
51
76
67
77
71
68
67
65
61
71
80
67
72
81
65
68
Bank of America
Barclays
Citi
Credit Suisse
Deutsche Bank
Goldman Sachs
JP Morgan
Morgan Stanley
RBS
UBS
• Q1 2014
• Q1 2013
the simplification of
products and the move
to exchanges will order
a rationalisation of
product processes and
the operations that
support them.
achieved with a necessarily bold approach
to outsourcing to decommission non-core
businesses.
In APAC, Nomura has radically simplified
its trading structure, routing equity
execution to Instinet and merging their
fixed income and equity platforms once it
became clear that their market share did
not support the complexity of two
separate platforms.
Nevertheless, there are banks which will
keep a broad client service model. Credit
Suisse has rationalised to meet the
increased cost of business by creating an
off-balance sheet FI trading platform –
which currently contributes to 20% of the
firm’s share priceiii
– and apportioning off
Wake USA operationally, allowing them to
retain a full service desk without holding
the required capital.
For streamlined business models,
cross-product rationalisation is achievable;
for those retaining a broader service
model, operational rationalisation across
departments enables operational simplicity.
Standardisation
Furthermore, the simplification of products
and the move to exchanges will order a
rationalisation of product processes and the
operations that support them.
And yet, cost bases continue to vary
hugely across peers (see Fig.2). Cost
inefficiencies are, in part, driven by a
traditional reticence in investment banking
iii Based on Forbes / Trefis analysis, 2014
toward outsourcing, where the
industry remains 10-15 years behind
other industries. However, third-party
vendors have reacted to this
standardisation by developing
deployable solutions. These solutions
can enable rationalisation and
decommissioning, where required, at
drastically reduced levels of cost.
Source: Accenture Research

5. 5
Captive vs. third-party headcount for BPO
June 2014, Percentage
Source: Accenture Sourcing Research, Everest • Captives • Third Party Providers
97% 3%Bank A
Bank B
Bank C
Bank D
Bank E
Bank F
Bank G
Bank H
Bank I
Bank J
Bank K
95% 5%
55% 45%
35% 65%
9%
100%
100%
85% 15%
90% 10%
100%
90%
91%
85%Bank A
Bank B
Bank C
Bank D
Bank E
Bank F
Bank G
Bank H
Bank I
Bank J
Bank K
46%
15%
5%
60%
20%
25-30%
43%
75%
35%
70-75%
75%
Captive vs. third-party headcount for IT
June 2014, Percentage
Figure 4: Captive operating costs vs. vendor rates
Totall annual fully loaded captive operating cost
per FTE and comparison with vendor rates
2014; US$ in 000s
0 10 20 30 40 50
• Captive cost • Service provider rates
Transactional F&A
A steady accretion of
complexity has taken
place over many years
within investment banks,
masked by pre-financial
crisis revenues and
profitability.
Indeed, certain investment banks’ captive
offshoring functions have achieved lower
operating costs compared to vendor
rates. However, the smaller range in
third-party vendor costs reflects
competitiveness borne of standardisation.
The potential to develop in reduced cost,
“greenfield” environments provides scope
for the outsourcing of non-
differentiating functions – meeting the
dual objectives of cutting costs and
competing only in spaces where the bank
is differentiated (see Fig.3 and Fig.4).
In the case of decommissioning, these
reduced cost profiles create the
possibility of moving assets from the
bank’s balance sheet, achieving effective
wind-down in a way conducive to
increasingly stringent capital compliance
ratios. They also offer the chance to
reduce the burden of non-differentiating,
fixed cost functions for those aspiring to
full service offerings.
A steady accretion of complexity has
taken place over many years within
investment banks, masked by
pre-financial crisis revenues and
profitability. Post-crisis, the powerful
imperatives of regulation, cost reduction
and client expectation are forcing banks
to address this complexity by clearly
defining their offerings, simplifying their
operating structures, and rationalising
common processes and technology
across a more focused organisation.
This is no simple undertaking, and the
challenge – in the face of complex
legacy operating systems and
governance models – is for banks to
build effectively around what they
need, not simply superimpose on
what they already have.
Figure. 3: The use of captive vs. third-party providers
Source: Accenture Research

6. About Accenture
Accenture is a global management
consulting, technology services and
outsourcing company, with more
than 305,000 people serving clients in
more than 120 countries. Combining
unparalleled experience, comprehensive
capabilities across all industries and
business functions, and extensive
research on the world’s most successful
companies, Accenture collaborates
with clients to help them become
high-performance businesses and
governments. The company generated
net revenues of US$30.0 billion for the
fiscal year ended Aug. 31, 2014. Its home
page is www.accenture.com.
Accenture Experts
To discuss any of the ideas presented in
this paper please contact:
Wei Min Chin
Managing Director
Accenture Capital Markets, Asia Pacific
wei.min.chin@accenture.com
+86 21 2305 3832
Tomasz Walkowicz
Capital Markets Research, London
tomasz.m.walkowicz@accenture.com
+44 207 844 5542
Disclaimer
This report has been prepared by and is distributed by Accenture. This document is for
information purposes. No part of this document may be reproduced in any manner
without the written permission of Accenture. While we take precautions to ensure
that the source and the information we base our judgments on is reliable, we do not
represent that this information is accurate or complete and it should not be relied upon
as such. It is provided with the understanding that Accenture is not acting in a fiduciary
capacity. Opinions expressed herein are subject to change without notice.
Copyright © 2014 Accenture
All rights reserved.
Accenture, its logo, and
High Performance Delivered
are trademarks of Accenture.