ACA Group acquires Catelas to create industry-first 360 surveillance

By Edlyn Cardoza

ACA Group (ACA), a leading governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) advisor in financial services, has acquired Catelas, a sophisticated machine learning-based electronic communications (eComms) surveillance and investigations platform. Catelas ingests all types of eComms, trade alerts, and voice calls to provide buy – and sell-side firms globally with a single view of potential high-risk activities and behaviours across their organization.

The acquisition of Catelas further enhances the holistic surveillance capabilities of ACA’s RegTech platform. Catelas’ patented technology automates the mapping of how people connect and form groups within a firm, isolates collusion risk, and detects high-risk behaviors. In 2022, Catelas will integrate with ACA’s award-winning regulatory technology platform, ComplianceAlpha®. This integration gives firms unique oversight of control room activities, trade and eComms surveillance, wall crossing, bribery, and other material risks through one central platform.

Danielle Tierney, Senior Analyst at Greenwich Associates, said, “The demand for integration throughout the trade surveillance alert process is driving innovation across the compliance landscape. Firms who take action and invest in technologies to conduct surveillance across trading and communications are taking important steps to protect their employees, markets, and stay on the on top of regulatory demands.”

Eddie Cogan, ACA Group Partner and founder of Catelas said, “Electronic communications surveillance is critical to compliance and is becoming increasingly complex as firms move to Microsoft Teams, WeChat, Slack, Zoom, and other virtual communications tools. Globally, firms are at risk if they are not diligent about tracking and surveilling activity alongside personal and firm investments. We’re excited to join the ACA team and deliver Catelas’ advanced eComms analytics within ComplianceAlpha.”

Shvetank Shah, Chief Executive Officer, ACA Group said, “ACA’s vision is to build a fully integrated, holistic regulatory risk and compliance management platform that provides a single view into all activities that could put firms at risk. Bringing the Catelas team into the ACA family helps firms create a more efficient compliance operating model, better protecting them from regulatory fines and reputational damage while decreasing the overall cost of compliance.”

ComplianceAlpha® integrates risk and compliance activities, automated surveillance, ongoing monitoring, flexible workflows, enhanced analytics, and managed services delivery. Designed, developed, and supported by ACA’s experienced team that includes over 200 former regulators and compliance officers in addition to subject matter experts in cybersecurity and technology, the platform is used by over 1,000 leading financial services firms worldwide to build more scalable and resilient compliance programs.

Catelas was founded in 2007 and has locations in Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco. The firm’s surveillance platform is used by global banks, asset managers, and capital market firms to isolate the risks that could harm the business without overloading reviewers with false positives.