Northern Trust has announced the launch of its Australian Investment Accounting platform, an innovative solution that combines local expertise and specialised reporting with Northern Trust's global capabilities to provide a range of custody and fund accounting and administration services to superannuation funds and investment managers in Australia.
"We are delighted to bring a unique product to the Australian market - one that is specifically designed to meet the sophisticated and complex regulatory reporting requirements of the Australian market while also leveraging the breadth of our single, global technology and operations architecture," said Paul Cutts, Northern Trust's Managing Director for Australia and New Zealand.
"This significant offering highlights Northern Trust's commitment to provide a broader array of custody, accounting and administration services to the Australia financial services industry and provides a foundation for long-term growth in this market."
Northern Trust's Australian Investment Accounting platform offers clients immediate access to fund accounting, net asset values, fund administration and regulatory reporting. Utilising Northern Trust's global operating platform ensures that client reporting is driven from a single transaction source and enables delivery of a full suite of online tools including daily performance and compliance monitoring already available to sophisticated institutional investors in Australia and 40 other countries.
LSV Asset Management, a U.S.-based investment manager with institutional mandates in Australia and New Zealand, is the first investment manager to transition to the new accounting platform. Tremaine Atkinson, Chief Operating Officer of LSV, said the platform will automate the complex accounting process for Australia's market requirements and help ensure the accuracy of NAVs.
"In volatile markets, automated accounting is essential to reducing risk," Atkinson said. "Northern Trust's platform eliminates the manual processing and reconciliations that can cause errors."
Northern Trust's accounting and regulatory reporting capabilities are integrated with its market-leading risk and performance tools and delivered via Passport, its multi-faceted online portal. The Australian fund accounting team is led by Bernie McGrath, Head of Australian Fund Accounting, who has more than 20 years experience in this market including consulting, custody, fund accounting and tax. Northern Trust has continued to grow its presence in Australia since obtaining regulatory approval in 2008.
