The theme of Sibos Frankfurt 2025 — the next frontier of global finance — resonates strongly with BNP Paribas’ Securities Services business. Speaking at the bank’s booth, Franck Dubois reflected on his three decades in the industry and described Sibos as a place to “meet with clients, listen to them” and also reconnect with peers and friends. He outlined key priorities for securities services in Asia Pacific (APAC) and how BNP Paribas is responding to accelerating private capital flows, digitalisation and regulatory demands. Supporting globalisation and private capital growth Dubois said the first strategic priority is “the continuation of the globalisation” of financial markets, where BNP Paribas helps “global investors invest across various countries.” The second is “the development of private capital,” which has become increasingly important, as some investors are saying “very soon they’ll be 50-50 invested in private and public” markets. Dubois emphasised that this shift would require new infrastructure and data capabilities. The third priority is “everything around innovation, digitalisation, tokenisation and artificial intelligence (AI),” which he linked to both a paradigm shift and opportunity. He acknowledged ongoing regulatory and other thematic issues but stressed that these three trends dominate client conversations at Sibos. Managing shorter settlement cycles and operational change The securities services industry is undergoing major change in settlement cycles. Dubois noted the US market’s recent move to T+1 settlement, following India, while “China is already T+0.” Europe is preparing for its own transition. BNP Paribas’ Securities Services business has “the know-how and capacity” to support clients because it managed the US transition successfully. “It went well,” he said, but highlighted that further investments will be needed “by everybody in the chain including financial intermediaries” to adapt. Automating and industrialising private markets Public markets are already highly automated, but “the private market by construction [is] less industrial than the public market,” Dubois observed. As more investors allocate to private capital, “the more automation and industrialisation we can bring” to it. BNP Paribas’ Securities Services business is one of the top users of the Aladdin platform developed by BlackRock and has “a strong partnership” with BlackRock to bring sophisticated solutions to private assets. The bank is also investing in data management capacity through AssetMetrix, a fintech in which it holds a stake, and has announced a partnership with NeoXam for a new product called Data PRISM360 to help clients manage data across both private and public markets. Leveraging digitalisation, technology and partnerships Dubois said the Securities Services business’ digitalisation strategy benefits from the BNP Paribas Group’s global scale: “Digitalisation is something which impacts all businesses in the bank and being part of a large group helps to have the capacity to invest.” He stressed that safety, security and trust are “the number one priority” for clients. This includes the solidity of the bank’s balance sheet, investment in IT platforms to mitigate cyber risk, and operational resilience supported by a network of centres of excellence in India, Poland, Lisbon and a new centre being developed in Manila. On technology, Dubois said distributed ledger technology and blockchain have moved from “revolution” to “a technical component now embedded in the solutions we bring.” AI, application programming interfaces (APIs) and the cloud are equally important, but must be deployed securely with strong data protection. BNP Paribas believes “the best use case” for new technology comes from partnering with clients and testing innovations together. Operating as a platform with ecosystem partners Dubois agreed that BNP Paribas increasingly operates like a horizontal platform integrating ecosystem partners to deliver end solutions. “Nobody in this industry can pretend to do everything alone,” he said. He cited partnerships with BlackRock on Aladdin and with NeoXam on data management as examples of collaborating to bring better solutions to clients. Trust, scale and innovation in securities services Dubois’ remarks show how BNP Paribas’ Securities Services business is combining global reach, private capital expertise, digitalisation and partnerships to support clients in APAC and worldwide. By helping them manage shorter settlement cycles, automate private markets and adopt new technology securely, the bank aims to reinforce trust and operational resilience while embracing the next frontier of securities services.
