Post-Trade Automation for UK Capital Markets: Cut Costs by 34%

Market · United Kingdom

Take 34% out of post-trade cost. Keep the front office.

NOVA CMX automates the middle and back office behind the OMS you already run. T+1 is live in production, including with a UK client. Twelve weeks to go-live, no upfront licence fee, no rip-and-replace.

Business outcomes delivered

T+1

live in production, and T+0
ready

>95%

straight-through processing

>34%

average reduction in operating costs

12

week go-live with nearly 70% out-of-box functionalities

The real risk

T+1 does not create the problem. It removes the buffer that hid it.

Under T+2, overnight batches and spreadsheet reconciliation are an inconvenience. Under T+1, they are settlement risk.

The current operating model

Fragmented middle and back office across multiple vendors
Overnight batch processing and next-morning breaks
Manual exception handling and spreadsheet reconciliation
Affirmation, funding and FX squeezed into a shorter day
Operational dependency on a handful of specialists

On NOVA CMX

One platform across trades, settlement, custody and corporate actions
Real-time processing and validation at capture
Intraday reconciliation and automated exception management
Predictive fail scoring before the settlement cut-off
Predictive fail scoring before the settlement cut-off
Already covered

Four shifts landing on the same operations team.

Each is already running on NOVA CMX in production.

11 Oct 2027

UK, EU and Swiss T+1

The first UK cash-equity trade date for T+1 settlement, aligned with the EU and Switzerland. The Taskforce code of conduct sets 12 critical and 26 highly recommended actions, expects firms ready to test in early 2027, and will benchmark performance against the average CREST settlement rate for July to September 2027. NOVA is already settling T+1 in production, including for a UK client.

Now

24×5 US trading

US venues are extending toward near-continuous trading, with Nasdaq targeting a 23-hour, five-day model from December 2026 and DTCC extending clearing to match. A UK desk holding US lines loses the overnight processing window. NOVA runs without one.

Live

Digital assets

Tokenised instruments, crypto transfers and custody workflows are processed on the same ledger as equities, fixed income and derivatives - with a full audit trail, not a separate operational silo.

2027

AI in post-trade

Agentic exception triage, ML-assisted matching inside the rules and exception engine, and trade-level predictive fail scoring - native to the platform, configurable, and fully audited. Recon error rates already run below 1%.

The business case

What it does to the cost base.

95-98%

Straight-through processing achieved

20-40%

TCO reduction via STP and vendor consolidation

25-50%

lower labour cost in reconciliation & exceptions

12-18mo

Typical payback on targeted automation​

The C-suite outcome

Meet the deadline without a multi-year replacement programme.

01

T+1 proven, not planned

Already live in production, including with a UK client.

02

Lower implementation risk

Modernise the operating model without replacing the technology estate.

Lower implemen-tation risk

Modernise the operating model without replacing the technology estate.

03

Cost decoupled from volume

Growth and new asset classes absorbed on unchanged headcount.

04

Regulatory evidence by default

Reporting and audit trail generated from the settlement record.

05

Downside protected

Zero upfront fee, modular go-live, no forced rip-and-replace.

Capital markets - engineered

Book a 60-minute T+1 readiness assessment.

Firms that wait until 2027 will be competing for the same resources and implementation capacity as everyone else.

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