Systems and methods for objective financing of assets

• US 7,881,995 B2
• Filed: 07/02/2004
• Issued: 02/01/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 07/02/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Capital Tool Co.
• Original Assignee: Capital Tool Co.
• Inventors: Grimberg, Robertus
• Primary Examiner(s): Kyle; Charles R
• Assistant Examiner(s): WEIS, SAMUEL
• Application Number:
  US10/882,166
• Publication Number:
  US 20060015421A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,405 Days
• Field of Search: 705/35, 705/36.R, 705/37, 705/38, 705/39
• US Class Current: 705/35
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/00 Finance; Insurance; Tax strategies; Processing of corporate or income taxes
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/03 Credit; Loans; Processing thereof
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/04 Trading; Exchange, e.g. stocks, commodities, derivatives or currency exchange
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/06 Asset management; Financial planning or analysis

Abstract

Systems, methods, and computer program products consistent with the principles of the present invention provide an infrastructure for asset owners to obtain financing arrangements from a multitude of liability providers in near real time and objectively.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method to optimize a financing of additional assets, that may be added into a pool of assets, using at least one liability instrument, wherein the pool of assets is within a financed asset portfolio, the method comprising:

obtaining data on the assets in the pool of assets from a treasurer and from the financed asset portfolio;

storing, in a memory device, the data obtained for the assets in the pool of assets and in the financed asset portfolio;

learning, with a processor, a behavior of the assets in the pool of assets and the financed asset portfolio based on the data obtained, wherein learning comprises estimating a cash flow distribution originating from the assets in the pool of assets and in the financed asset portfolio;

creating a sell option for the pool of assets, the sell option comprising the additional assets, which are held by the treasurer and which may be added to the pool of assets in the financed asset portfolio;

projecting, by the processor, future cash flows of the financed asset portfolio with and without the additional assets in the sell option based on the behavior learned;

determining a set of possible funding options to fund the sell option, wherein each possible funding option comprises at least one liability instrument; and

presenting the set of possible funding options to a user on a display device.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein creating a sell option comprises:

creating a sell option using at least one technique from a group comprising;

actuarial pool rules, manual interfaces, and random selection.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising executing a plug-in procedure to perform at least one of:

estimating cash flow distribution for the pool of assets;

estimating cash flow distribution for the financed asset portfolio;

or

estimating cash flow distribution for the at least one liability instrument.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein determining a set of possible funding options comprises:

calculating an All-in Finance Cost (AFC) for each funding option in the set.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

calculating the AFC for each funding option in the set based on at least one form of liability instrument pricing, chosen from the group comprising;

committed pricing, latest pricing, extrapolated pricing, and indexed pricing.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein presenting the set of possible funding options comprises:

receiving at least one funding-option characteristic desired by a user;

determining an optimal funding option based on the at least one desired characteristic; and

presenting the optimal funding option to at least one user.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein at least one of the steps of learning the behavior of the assets, projecting future cash flows of the financed asset portfolio, and determining a set of possible funding options is performed using at least one plug-in procedure, the plug-in procedure being adapted to run simultaneously with other plug-in procedures.

8. The method according to claim 7, further comprising:

running a test procedure on a goal to determine the adequacy of the at least one plug-in procedure.

9. The method according to claim 8, wherein the test procedure uses at least one of:

benchmarking and historic performance.

10. The method according to claim 7, further comprising:

analyzing at least one of;

a current effect and a historical effect; and

choosing an optimal plug-in procedure based on the comparing.

11. The method according to claim 8, further comprising:

selecting a plug-in procedure for a deal or goal based on a result of the test procedure.

12. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

determining a set of possible goals using at least one plug-in procedure;

wherein each goal of the set of possible goals is further subdivided into goals with tests and plug-in procedures, which may be selected by the user.

13. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

prohibiting changes to a plug-in procedure after the plug-in procedure is used by at least one user.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

prohibiting changes to a test procedure after the test procedure is used by at least one user.

15. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

expressing a future performance of the pool of assets as a cash flow distribution.

16. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

closing an open pool of assets, wherein no further sell options may be added.

17. The method of claim 1, wherein creating a sell option comprises:

periodically creating a sell option based on an actuarial pool rule and a target set by a treasurer.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein determining a set of possible funding options comprises:

calculating an All-in Finance Cost (AFC) of a possible funding option in the set by summing a cost of each liability instrument and a service fee.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the cost of each liability instrument is at least one of:

a committed price, a recent executed price, an index-based price, an extrapolated price, and an estimated price.

20. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one liability instrument comprises:

a liability instrument that supports a subset of the assets in the portfolio.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the subset is one of:

a pool, an individual asset, or a group of individual assets.

22. The method of claim 6, further comprising:

determining an optimal combination of a sell option and a funding option based on an optimization target set by a treasurer and an optimization target set by a liability provider; and

presenting the optimal combination to at least one user.

23. The method of claim 22, wherein the optimization target set by a treasurer is an All-in Finance Cost (AFC), and

wherein the optimization target set by the liability provider is a desired terms and conditions constraint.

24. The method of claim 22, wherein the optimization target is at least one of:

multiple optimization targets set by the treasurer, or multiple optimization targets set by the liability provider.

25. The method of claim 1, wherein determining a set of possible funding options comprises:

determining at least one characteristic for a funding option from the group comprising;

an amount of exposure, an amount of risk, a return, and a value indicator; and

wherein presenting the set comprises;

presenting the determined characteristic to the user.

26. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

using a plug-in procedure to find a funding option with a characteristic specified by the user and to request the at least one liability instrument associated with the found funding option from at least one liability provider for each liability instrument.

27. A computer readable medium storing program instructions which, when executed by a processor, optimize a financing of additional assets, that may be added to a pool of assets, using at least one liability instrument, wherein the pool of assets is within a financed asset portfolio, the program instructions comprising program instructions adapted to perform the following when executed by a processor:

creating a sell option for the pool of assets, the sell option comprising the additional assets, which are held by a treasurer and which may be added to the pool of assets in the financed asset portfolio;

projecting future cash flows of the financed asset portfolio with and without the additional assets in the sell option based on behavior learned about the assets in the pool of assets and in the financed asset portfolio, wherein the behavior learned includes an estimated cash flow distribution originating from the assets in the pool of assets and in the financed asset portfolio;

determining a set of possible funding options to fund the sell option, wherein each possible funding option comprises at least one liability instrument; and

presenting the set of possible funding options.

28. The computer readable medium of claim 27, further comprising program instructions that are adapted to perform at least one of the following when executed by a processor:

estimating cash flow distribution for the pool of assets;

estimating cash flow distribution for the financed asset portfolio;

or

estimating cash flow distribution for the at least one liability instrument.

29. The system computer readable medium of claim 27, wherein presenting the set of possible funding options comprises:

receiving at least one funding-option characteristic desired by a user;

determining an optimal funding option based on the at least one desired characteristic; and

presenting the optimal funding option to at least one user.

30. The computer readable medium of claim 27, wherein at least one of the projecting future cash flows of the financed asset portfolio, and determining a set of possible funding options is performed simultaneously with other procedures.

31. The computer readable medium of claim 30, further comprising program instructions that are adapted to perform the following when executed by a processor:

running a test procedure on a goal to determine the adequacy of the at least one plug-in procedure.

32. The computer readable medium of claim 29, further comprising program instructions that are adapted to perform the following when executed by a processor:

determining an optimal combination of a sell option and a funding option based on an optimization target set by the treasurer and an optimization target set by the liability provider; and

presenting the optimal combination to at least one user.