exchange ecosystem

Connamara Technologies is pleased to announce that it has successfully completed the Service Organization Controls (SOC) 2 Type II certification created by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA). This certification demonstrates the company’s commitment to the highest standards of client confidentiality and information security with all of its policies, practices, and systems subjected to review. In collaboration with Vanta for continuous monitoring and Johanson Group for formal certification, Connamara demonstrated its scrupulous adherence to the highest standards for data security.

Achieving SOC 2 Type II certification marks a significant organizational milestone in the evolution of Connamara Technologies. SOC 2 is a cybersecurity compliance framework and a widely recognized and respected compliance standard for companies entrusted with sensitive data. Connamara Technologies’ successful certification provides enterprise customers and partners with enhanced confidence.  

“Many of our EP3 customers operate exchanges that are government regulated. Although Connamara Technologies is not a regulated entity, we wanted  to demonstrate  the same level of security controls, policies, and procedures that our customers must meet. The SOC 2 Type II certification allows us to show, on a yearly basis, that we do indeed meet the required levels of client confidentiality and information security,” remarked James Downs, Co-Founder and CEO of Connamara Technologies, upon certification. “We are committed to continually updating and enhancing our practices to keep this longstanding commitment to our customers.” 

The full SOC-2 Type II certification report is available upon request. Please reach out to a Connamara Technologies team member with any questions.

About SOC 2

SOC 2 is a component of the American Institute of CPAs‘ (AICPA) Service Organization Control reporting platform. SOC 2 reports assess and attest to an organization’s controls per AICPA’s 5 Trust Service Criteria: security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, and privacy. SOC 2 includes a technical audit and confirmation that comprehensive information security policies and procedures are documented and followed.

About Connamara Technologies:

Connamara Technologies builds future-ready exchange platforms and order-matching engines. It’s the company behind EP3, the advanced exchange platform, and order-matching engine incubated by Connamara Systems. Learn more: https://www.connamara.tech/company/

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We are excited to announce that Connamara Technology has joined the Environmental Markets Association (EMA). This membership highlights our dedication to creating innovative exchange platforms for environmental markets. 

As an EMA member, we’ll have the opportunity to engage with industry leaders in the evolving landscape of environmental markets such as carbon offsets, alternative energy trading, and other asset classes still yet to be created. This will help Connamara develop tailored solutions that effectively address the unique challenges faced by this industry.

About the Environmental Markets Association (EMA)

EMA functions as a dynamic hub for collaborative efforts, uniting diverse perspectives with a shared objective: the effective implementation of market-driven solutions to benefit our environment. 

With members that include environmental asset brokers, exchanges, large utilities, law firms, project developers, consultants, academics, NGOs and government agencies, EMA acts as a focal point for sharing expertise, facilitating knowledge transfer, and advocating for industry-wide progress.

Notably, EMA assumes the role of vigilant oversight, closely monitoring legislative and regulatory developments that impact these markets, thereby ensuring their adherence to high standards of environmental responsibility.

Transforming Insights into Innovation

With our proven track record of delivering EP3, an exchange matching engine and platform, for a variety of markets worldwide, the alignment with the EMA furthers our mission to open new cutting-edge markets and improve infrastructure for existing markets to evolve with the industry. 

At Connamara, our expertise lies in crafting scalable, dependable, and adaptable exchange platforms that empower marketplaces to operate their market with confidence and ease. With our EMA membership, we strengthen our ability to engage directly with market participants so that EP3 has up-to-date functionality, providing comprehensive solutions that align with the highest standards of market integrity within environmental markets.

“Connamara has always been a leader in developing new markets so it was an obvious decision for us to join the Environmental Markets Association given our prior experience with environmental market technology and evolution going on in the industry,” Connamara’s Head of Growth Dan Davis said.

Delivering an Environmental Market Advantage

By choosing Connamara Technologies as your exchange matching software provider, you get an ecosystem of expertise, collaboration, and thought leadership designed to foster your growth and success in environmental markets.

Learn more about EP3, our exchange platform technology and stay tuned as we harness the power of the EMA community to deliver solutions that foster your growth and set you up for success. 

If ease of implementation and speed to market are priorities for your new exchange, an ‘off-the-shelf’ matching engine software solution can sound appealing. But it’s important to remember that not all ‘white label’ solutions are created equal as the definition is broad. While many solutions out there promise ease on the path to your first trade (in some cases just minutes!), the reality is far more complex.

Here’s what you need to know when choosing the right solution for your needs.

Customizing for Your Constituents

It’s crucial to choose a matching exchange software solution that provides your desired level of customization and flexibility. Some products may offer operators limited customization options, restricting branding and the ability to differentiate, while other products afford operators more discretion, but comes with fewer tools that have been proven in market. Whether it’s implementing specialized trading features, integrating unique components, or accommodating specific user preferences, the product you choose should match the level of customization your target audience, regulators, and growth targets require.

Build for the Buyer

Building a successful exchange is a multifaceted job that requires ongoing support and expert guidance, yet is meaningless unless the exchange is able to attract and retain liquidity of buyers and sellers on the exchange. While white label solutions provide a basic foundation, some may lack the professional services and support necessary to address complex technical issues and provide continuous improvements that will encourage a thriving marketplace. Without access to a team of engineers, developers, and support, exchange operators may find themselves unable to handle critical situations, security vulnerabilities, and tailor their market for sustained success.

Be Regulatory Ready

Depending on the industry, regulators may require controls, rules, or infrastructure provisions outside of the scope of technology that brands itself as being self-serve or SaaS (Software as a Service). EP3 customers like Tera Exchange require connections to unique vendors for their SEF approval, while other exchanges may have unique on-prem requirements. The decision to use SaaS or non-SaaS for all or parts of your exchange ecosystem depends on factors such as data security, regulatory requirements, and control over the exchange infrastructure. Exclusive access to your environment, hiring the right team, and utilizing the right tools to understand the health of the exchange are all incredibly important aspects of maintaining a fair, orderly, and compliant market. Components in EP3, like market surveillance, empower operators through features that allow for thorough monitoring and alerting.

Future-proof in the Present

The journey of an exchange doesn’t end with its launch; it’s just the beginning. As the market evolves and customer demands change, the exchange must adapt and scale accordingly. ‘Off-the-shelf’ solutions typically lack the flexibility to accommodate future needs and growth opportunities by not providing support, or professional services and there are often limitations in the product like the inability to add new asset classes, order types, or implement controls for impending regulation. Using a product that offers a layer of human support as Connamara Technology does can remedy many of these issues common with highly productized exchange solutions.

EP3 continues to grow and scale, implementing feedback from customers and extending its functionality and ease of use. A great example is our Jobs API, designed to eliminate a common headache for exchange operators and streamline the EP3 user experience.

Not Sure Where to Start? We Can Help.

By leveraging a platform like EP3, you get the best of both worlds — the proven functionality of an existing platform, with the customization, team, and resources you need to accelerate your time to market so you can focus on delivering an exceptional trading experience for your users.

Learn more about our discovery process and how we can help you get to the first trade faster.

When it comes to choosing the right exchange platform software, it’s important to find a robust trade matching engine with an experience that’s both easy to use and easy to navigate. At Connamara, we understand the needs of exchange operators, which is why we developed the Jobs API to make your life easier.

The Cloud Tool Chaos Problem

Prior to the introduction of the Jobs API for the EP3 exchange platform, exchange operators were faced with the challenge of having to navigate multiple cloud vendor tools to keep track of various jobs on the platform. This created a disjointed experience that made it difficult to monitor the status of crucial back-office processes, including regulatory reports and backups.

Without a centralized view of these processes, exchange operators had to spend valuable time switching between various interfaces and tools, making it difficult to quickly troubleshoot issues and gain insights into their system.

Introducing the Jobs API

As part of our commitment to making our EP3 trade matching engine and exchange platform software as user-friendly as possible, we’ve introduced a new API that simplifies and streamlines processes, while providing exchange operators fine-grained visibility into the platform.

With the addition of the Jobs API, exchange operators can now view the status of all jobs on the platform, including regulatory reports, backups, and other timed back-office processes — all within the admin user interface. Whether it’s grabbing logs, troubleshooting the environment, or getting insights into your system — you can do it all without leaving the Admin interface.

Simplifying your Tool Kit

Rather than relying on an entire kit of tools, you can view the status of scheduled tasks in one place. This feature enables users to see if jobs are running or if they failed and run actions on them. For example, you can effortlessly schedule all necessary regulatory reports to automatically run on your schedule.

Another useful feature of the Jobs API is the ability to extract logs. If a software component is not communicating correctly with third parties, you can view the communication and diagnose/resolve problems. Users can also manually run a job for a specific date. For example, if a regulatory report failed to run, you can rerun it and for a specific date.

Seamless Integration, Exceptional Experience

Our leading-edge tools are designed to provide users with unparalleled visibility and control over their exchange platform, eliminating the need for juggling multiple cloud tools. With our state-of-the-art APIs, all the essential tools are consolidated in one convenient location, allowing you to effortlessly monitor the status of various components and take prompt action whenever required.

This approach to exchange platform management offers a streamlined and user-friendly experience, making EP3 the ultimate choice for anyone seeking to optimize their exchange platform management. As we continue to improve and build on the Jobs API’s functionality, you can look forward to more features and capabilities that will further simplify and streamline your work.

Looking to launch a new exchange or upgrade your existing exchange? Contact us to see how you can leverage EP3.

In today’s global economy, exchanges play a crucial role in facilitating economic transactions between individuals, businesses, and governments. But the exchange ecosystem is far more complex than you might realize.

While the exchange is responsible for order matching, reporting data, and facilitating the trade, it’s just one part of the larger exchange ecosystem. There are many other moving parts — including systems, entities, and people — working behind the scenes to ensure a seamless transaction at every step.

Three Core Components of the Exchange Ecosystem

The exchange ecosystem is made up of three primary components: the exchange, distribution, and clearing.

The exchange is the heart of the ecosystem. It has several essential functions, including the order matching engine, which matches buyers and sellers based on the price and time of their transactions. The exchange must also manage the trading schedule and generate reports for both internal and regulatory purposes. Maintaining a fair and orderly market for all participants is the mandate of any exchange. To fulfill this mandate, the exchange must reliably stay open, surveil for bad actors, and monitor the health of the platform.

As part of the exchange ecosystem, distribution is a critical function that allows investors access to the market. This network often involves brokers or other intermediaries who connect their systems to the exchange to ensure that the investor’s transactions are securely routed to the exchange. They perform pre-trade and post-trade risk management on customer accounts to manage financial risk.

In addition to the exchange and distribution, trade clearing and settlement is another critical component of an exchange’s infrastructure. Clearing houses assume the counter-party risk by becoming the buyer to every seller and the seller to every buyer on the exchange.  They play a crucial role in settling transactions, ensuring that buyers receive their assets and sellers receive their payments. They also act as a safety net in case of any clearing member defaults, using the clearing member clearing fund to backstop any losses.

The Exchange Ecosystem in Action

To understand the exchange ecosystem, let’s take a stock exchange as an example. For instance, Customer A wants to buy 100 shares of Apple at a price of $150 per share and Customer B wants to sell 100 shares of Apple at the same price. They would log on to their account at their broker, or instruct their broker, to enter their respective orders to buy and sell. These orders would then be sent electronically to the exchange where the orders would be placed into a Central Limit Order Book (CLOB) for the shares of Apple.

Once both orders are in the CLOB, the buy and sell orders are matched using order-matching technology. A report of the trade is then sent to the broker systems, which are then relayed to the customers and to a clearinghouse for settlement.

From the market participants’ perspective, this is a simple process automated by the exchange’s infrastructure technologies that allow these different parts of the ecosystem to seamlessly integrate.

Ensuring the Security of User Assets and Transactions

Security is a top priority in the exchange ecosystem. Regulated exchanges and platforms, like EP3^TM, have put strong measures in place to protect customer assets and transactions. Regulatory agencies are the first line of defense and provide a framework that all participants must follow. These agencies audit the activities of those involved to ensure they comply with regulations.

Additionally, brokerage firms must insure customer accounts to protect them in case of losses. Clearinghouses also require clearing members to contribute to a clearing fund to provide a backup in case any brokerage firms fail. All these precautions work together to create a secure environment for everyone involved in the exchange ecosystem.

While regulators are certainly a component of exchanges in regulated markets, they can vary greatly by jurisdiction and asset type. In unregulated markets, there are fewer of these regulatory controls, which allows for innovation in exchange technology, yet can also open up the exchange operator and customers to increased risk if not managed properly with the right technology.

Exchanges are complicated. EP3™ makes it easy.

Connamara’s future-ready exchange platform​, EP3, brings order to the chaos of the exchange ecosystem, providing a streamlined and efficient way for businesses and organizations to host their own exchange. From order matching technology, pre-trade risk checks, alternative market mechanisms, market surveillance, operational monitoring, and an easy-to-use exchange administration interface, we’ve combined all the necessary functionality into a configurable deployment tailored to your organization’s needs.

The use case described in this post is for a traditional exchange ecosystem. We are seeing exchanges being started in non-regulated spaces that combine all three functions in the exchange ecosystem. EP3 is equally suited for the non-traditional, non-regulated use case, and allows those exchanges to scale as their market evolves.

Looking to launch a new exchange or upgrade your existing exchange? Contact us to see how you can leverage EP3.