Complex Post-Trade Systems, Requirements Traceability and the Illusion of Control

The QA Financial Forum: Chicago 2019,
02.04.2019

Iosif Itkin , CEO and co-founder, Exactpro
Elena Treshcheva , Researcher, Exactpro

Website https://exactpro.com/

Linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/company/exactpro-systems-llc
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/exactpro/
Twitter https://twitter.com/exactpro
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/exactpro/
Youtube Channel https://www.youtube.com/c/exactprosystems

Transcript

1. Complex Post-Trade Systems, Requirements Traceability
   and the Illusion of Control
   Iosif Itkin, CEO and co-founder
   Elena Treshcheva, Researcher
   

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2. Exactpro Overview
   ● A specialist firm focused on functional and non-functional testing of
   exchanges, clearing houses, depositories, trade repositories and other
   financial market infrastructures.
   ● We provide software testing services for mission critical technology that
   underpins global financial markets. Our clients are regulated by FCA, Bank of
   England and their counterparts from other countries.
   ● We were part of the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) from May 2015
   till January 2018. Exactpro management buyout from LSEG was successfully
   completed in January 2018. We are headquartered in the UK and have
   operations in the US, Georgia and Russia.
   ● Incorporated in 2009 with 10 people, our company has
   experienced significant growth and is now employing
   over 550 specialists.
   

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3. We have a global Software Quality Assurance client network
   

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4. Build Software to Test Software
   

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5. Software Testing of Trading Systems
   Trading systems have very
   low latency (within hundreds
   of microseconds) ,...
   ...have significant
   throughput &
   capacity,....
   …and they should be resilient,
   have the ability to recover from
   outages and have no single
   point of failure
   

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6. Trading vs. Post-Trade
   Extreme testing challenges in high
   frequency trading systems pale in
   comparison to those presented by the
   post-trade infrastructures
   

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7. Key Technical Challenges in Delivering Large Post-Trade Initiatives
   Challenges:
   A typical clearing system has
   highly complex features requiring
   high degree of accuracy and
   skilled resources:
   1. Reference data;
   2. Risk management;
   3. The schedule (explained
   further in the presentation).
   

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8. Key Technical Challenges in Delivering Large Post-Trade Initiatives (continued)
   ● The number of components of complex post trade
   infrastructures is very high;
   ● Upstream and downstream systems dependency;
   ● The participant structure is very complex;
   ● Trade/Xfer/Position/Account life cycle;
   ● The number of Asset Classes may vary;
   ● The complexity of the Risk calculation process;
   ● Access via a set of API endpoints.
   The challenges and their parameterizations lead to a significant
   number of test scenarios.
   

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9. A Complex Post-Trade System During the Process of its Replacement
   

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10. Congruence bias
    Confirmation
    bias
    Law of triviality
    Zero-risk bias
    Anthropocentric
    thinking
    Illusion of control
    Cognitive Biases Affecting Software Testing
    

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11. Salman, I. (2016). Cognitive biases in software quality and testing. Proceedings of
    the 38th International Conference on Software Engineering Companion - ICSE ’16.
    Pp. 823-826.
    

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12. Mohanani, R., Salman, I., Turhan, B., Rodríguez, P., & Ralph, P. (2018).
    Cognitive Biases in Software Engineering: A Systematic Mapping Study.
    IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering
    

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13. Congruence Bias
    Direct
    Testing
    Indirect
    Testing
    Indirect
    Testing
    

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14. Indirect Testing Methods
    Information
    extraction and
    Machine learning
    End-to-End
    Automated Test
    Library
    Whatever it
    takes!
    Test execution
    data and log
    analysis
    Passive Testing
    Whatever it
    takes!
    

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15. Anthropocentric bias
    We should not
    humanize computers.
    

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16. Anthropocentric bias
    They dislike it a lot!
    

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17. Anthropocentric Bias: Testing a Mine-Defusing Robot
    

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18. Anthropocentric Bias: Why We Treat Robots Like Humans
    Darling, Kate and Nandy, Palash and Breazeal,
    Cynthia “Empathic Concern and the Effect of
    Stories in Human-Robot Interaction” (2015).
    Proceedings of the IEEE International Workshop on
    Robot and Human Communication (ROMAN),
    2015. 6 p.
    https://www.ted.com/talks/kate_darling_why_we_ha
    ve_an_emotional_connection_to_robots
    

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19. Anthropocentric Bias and Software Testing
    

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20. Ruthless and Cold-Hearted
    

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21. ClearTH - An Innovative Way to Test Post-Trade Systems
    

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22. Law of Triviality (the Bike-Shed Effect)
    

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23. What is the Difference Between a Problem and a Catastrophe?
    

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24. Zero-Risk Bias
    

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25. Test Management Systems and Requirements Traceability
    

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26. The Illusion of Control
    

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27. The Illusion of Control and Happiness
    Sherman, G. D., Lee, J. J., Cuddy, A. J. C., Renshon, J., Oveis, C., Gross, J. J., & Lerner,
    J. S. (2012). Leadership is associated with lower levels of stress. Proceedings of
    the National Academy of Sciences, 109(44), 17903–17907.
    

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28. Fenton-O’Creevy, M., Nicholson, N., Soane, E., &
    Willman, P. (2003). “Trading on illusions:
    Unrealistic perceptions of control and trading
    performance”. Journal of Occupational and
    Organizational Psychology, 76(1), 53–68.
    The Illusion of Control and Performance
    

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29. Software testing is relentless
    learning, continuous improvement
    and keeping abreast of
    cutting-edge technologies.
    The research and development
    team at Exactpro uses machine
    learning methods of intellectual
    data analysis to create next-
    generation program analysis
    tools.
    We work in an agile environment
    collaborating with a multinational
    team of software developers.
    R&D Case Study: Cradle Test Database for Machine Learning
    

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30. Applications of the Proposed Approach:
    https://unsplash.com/search/photos/san-francisco
    The First IEEE International Conference on Artificial
    Intelligence Testing (IEEE AITest 2019), April 4-9 2019, San
    Francisco East Bay, CA, USA
    User-Assisted Log Analysis for Quality
    Control of Distributed Fintech Systems
    Iosif Itkin, Anna Gromova, Anton Sitnikov, Rostislav Yavorskiy,
    Evgenii Tsymbalov, Andrey Novikov and Kirill Rudakov.
    

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31. EXTENT - Software Testing and Trading Technology Trends
    September 17
    Leadenhall Building,
    London, 2019
    Join us in discussing the newest fintech trends
    and solutions to the challenges in
    mission-critical trading and post trade systems!
    

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32. EXTENT - Software Testing and Trading Technology Trends
    September 17
    Leadenhall Building,
    London, 2019
    Join us in discussing the newest fintech trends
    and solutions to the challenges in
    mission-critical trading and post trade systems!
    

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33. Thank you! Questions?
    

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