Have you ever thought about what happens after a bank buys a bond? The trade happens and then…what’s next? What is happening behind the scenes? Trade settlement, income payments, collateral monitoring, corporate actions, safekeeping, bond accounting, monthly accounting entries…and the list goes on. Every trade creates something that has to be processed, monitored, or accounted for, and this is where our Investment Operations team comes in. They handle the details behind a bank’s investment activity that most people may never see or even think about.

Investment Operations is part of our Capital Markets team. Each area of Capital Markets plays a different role, but they all work together. Our sales team works directly with customers, and then much of that activity flows to Investment Operations for processing, portfolio accounting, safekeeping, and trading. Sounds like a lot, right? Well, it is! Investment Operations is a highly specialized area that requires extensive training and attention to detail. When you think about everything that can happen throughout the life of just one trade, you begin to understand how important all those little details really are.

Safekeeping is a good example. It is not a single event that ends once a trade settles; it is an ongoing lifecycle of receiving, verifying, protecting, monitoring, communicating, and ultimately closing out the position at maturity.However, Investment Operations is about more than processing transactions. One of the things that makes our approach different is that it is hands-on and customer centric. Our team works with a diverse group of people at each bank. Not everyone has the same investment knowledge, responsibilities, or even the same amount of time to devote to investments. Questions can range from understanding what a bond is to understanding why its value fluctuates or how to navigate a securities movement or custodial situation. Whatever the situation may be, our team wants to be a resource that helps customers find the best direction for them and their institution.

Investment Operations definitely does not work alone. The team collaborates with departments throughout FNBB, including Compliance, Operations, ALM, and others. This collaboration is important because one customer question may involve much more than one department or one service. The investment relationship can actually open the door to understanding more about what a community bank needs and how we can help. This becomes even more important as banks face changing risks and concerns surrounding topics like AI, fraud, phishing, and bad actors. Technology may continue to change how we work, but having knowledgeable people available to validate information, answer questions, and help navigate a situation is paramount.

The team described part of its approach as a “touch grass” philosophy, and I think that idea says a great deal about who we are at FNBB. As banking becomes more technological, automated, and systemic, we cannot lose touch with the people on the other side of the screen. Investments may only be one piece of a community banker’s day, but for our Investment Operations team, those details are their focus. Having the resources, knowledge, and people available to handle those details allows us to be more than just a service provider. It allows us to be a resource and a partner because at the end of the day, relationships are what banking is all about.