It is increasingly difficult for sell-side investment banks to find an edge in the competitive field of Global Markets. Pricing and execution have largely equalised across banks as electronic trading dominates and price discovery is more transparent. Similarly, public information flow is now mostly immediate to the majority of market participants. Research and investment ideas are increasingly the focus of sales desks as a weapon to stand out with clients and to drive alpha. As a result, the major investment banks are competing to be viewed as a “Trusted Advisor” on the markets by their top clients.

The more challenging part is how to achieve this status when the clients are bombarded with an avalanche of reports from so many competing banks. For the top clients this can often mean maintaining a coverage relationship with 15, or even more, banks. How does a sales person ensure that the right research piece reaches the right client at the right time? Limeglass offers a solution to this oversupply through its Digitisation of research.

Through Research Atomisation™, Limeglass enables salespeople to surface all the relevant paragraphs within their research library without having to sift through entire documents one-by-one. With instant access to relevant insights for their clients, salespeople will be able to deliver valuable, personalised interactions. Accordingly, each sales person and team are able to deliver research in an orderly way in their commercial day to day interactions. This approach affords a far more efficient distribution of research and significantly increases the penetration of the bank’s research product with clients with immediate commercial opportunities.

Over time, as the client is consistently delivered relevant and differentiating research insight the bank’s reputation will grow towards the status of “Trusted Advisor”. The client will often turn to such a bank with key questions or demands on a particular asset class. The business case that ensues should be clear. Of course, the orderly delivery of insightful and differentiating research ideas will take time to establish a rock-solid advisory reputation. As this process builds, however, the bank and sales team should see the goodwill effect of consistently adding value through individually-focused research delivery on a daily and weekly basis.