A-Team Insight Brief
Mariana UFP Selects TORA’s Cloud-based OEMS for Pairs Trading
Mariana UFP, a global broker, has selected cloud-based OEMS provider TORA for pairs trading in London, New York and Melbourne. In order to trade security pairs in large sizes, Mariana needed access to a range of sophisticated algorithms to fit potential trading strategies, and a capable OEMS to manage multiple orders simultaneously. Mariana opted for the TORA OEMS because the low-latency pairs trading tools offer a broad range of parameters to customise execution.
Options Extends Colocation Coverage at ASX
Options has extended colocation coverage for the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) at the Australian Liquidity Centre (ALC). This supplements existing market data access for clients in the region and across Options’ global managed colocation backbone. Options clients colocated within ASX will gain vendor access to ASX 24 and ASX Trade, bolstering the firm’s ultra-low-latency exchange feeds across equities and derivatives. The extension of ASX colocation is part of Options’ 2019 global platform expansion.
Investment Association Names Five Firms Joining Velocity Innovation Hub
The Investment Association has named the second cohort of FinTech firms joining its Velocity innovation hub for the buy-side and asset management industry: AxeTrading, a fixed income EMS delivering toolkits for trading connectivity, bonds pricing and data aggregation; BlueFireAI, which unlocks Chinese capital markets to foreign institutional investors; CUBE, an enterprise-scale platform delivering regulatory intelligence and change management; HUBX, a white-label solution for private markets advisors helping them track, distribute, and execute private deals; and Qwill Messenger, a single persistent chat app allowing clients of multiple firms to engage with staff within a space that is controlled by each firm.
BSO Becomes a Google Cloud Partner Interconnect Provider
BSO, a network, cloud and hosting services provider, has become a Google Cloud Partner Interconnect provider and will use the Google Dedicated Interconnect as a solution for connecting on-premise data centres to Google Cloud. BSO clients are onboarding with Partner Interconnect in Frankfurt and London, and the service will ultimately be available from all the 100+ PoPs presently on BSO’s global network. Emmanuel Pell, chief operating officer at BSO, says that for clients using artificial intelligence and machine learning, it is important to be able to burst into the public cloud from across the globe to meet business demands.
ULTUMUS Partners Velox Financial Technology
ULTUMUS, a provider of data services for index and exchange-traded fund products, has partnered Velox Financial Technology, a provider of real-time trading solutions for portfolio management, trading and analytics to investment banks and asset managers. The partnership sees ULTUMUS and Velox delivering services to clients as enterprise-wide managed data feeds as well as directly to trading desks, risk and performance attribution teams. Bernie Thurston, ULTUMUS CEO, says that using Velox’s trading technology framework will support the company’s services either in the cloud or installed on premise.
Oktris Offers MiFID II Transparency Reporting Services
Start-up regulatory reporting firm Oktris is offering MiFID II services beyond transaction and post-trade reporting with software-as-a-service solutions covering transparency calculation data reporting, instrument reference data reporting, and best execution reporting. The company also provides an ESMA and FCA Financial Instruments Reference Data System (FIRDS) solution that automates the task of taking large datasets from UK and EU regulators and puts the data in a database that can be queried and integrated with other financial systems. The company’s first client is a trading venue using the Oktris FIRDS and best execution services.
ION Group Acquires Allegro Development
ION Group has acquired Dallas-based Allegro Development, a commodity management solutions provider. The acquisition of Allegro is designed to expand ION’s footprint in commodities and its portfolio of enterprise solutions. Allegro intends to continue to expand its suite of offerings, while its clients can benefit from ION’s additional scale and offerings. ION last year acquired Fidessa to extend its reach in equities and derivatives trading solutions.
Asian Banks Struggle with FRTB
Banks across Asia are widely divergent in their implementation of Basel III rules, including the new Fundamental Review of the Trading Book (FRTB) regime. Panellists at the recent International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) conference in Hong Kong warned that this divergence is creating uncertainty, with some banks implementing the new rules to a high global standard while others have not yet begun or considered their compliance strategy.
FlexTrade Partners Goldman Sachs to Provide IOI Liquidity Directly from the Trading Blotter
FlexTrade Systems has partnered Goldman Sachs to release an extension of the latter’s indications of interest (IOI) functionality in the FlexTRADER execution management system (EMS). The functionality adds IOI profiling and analysis to FlexIOI, a framework for IOI distribution embedded in the EMS and providing interaction with IOI liquidity directly from the trading blotter. Traders are alerted in real-time to available IOIs for orders they are working, creating a view of liquidity avenues to achieve best execution. By actioning IOI liquidity directly from the blotter, traders can see the order proportion that can be completed using Goldman Sachs’ actionable liquidity.
Nucleus195 Partners Acuris to Join TIM Trade Idea Network
Nucleus195, a provider of global research and content across developed, emerging and frontier markets, has partnered with TIM, an Acuris company. The partnership will give content providers on the Nucleus195 platform an opportunity to potentially profit from their trade ideas via the TIM trade idea network. Colin Berthoud, founding partner at TIM, says Nucleus195 has a broad range of providers that will increase TIM’s trade idea network and provide investors with additional and innovative trade ideas.