About a-team Marketing Services
The knowledge platform for the financial technology industry
The knowledge platform for the financial technology industry

A-Team Insight Blogs

Primus Deploys Vela’s Metro to Take Advantage of Options Market Volatility

Subscribe to our newsletter

Chicago-based options trading firm Primus Capital has deployed Vela’s Metro trading platform to take advantage of the recent high volatility and trading volumes in the listed options marketplace. Primus was able to deploy the Metro platform on a remote basis and within 48 hours, offering traders working from home robust direct market access and the ability to price options and manage risk through a single platform.

Vela’s Metro is an end-to-end ISV platform that supports automated, algorithmic and click trading strategies that underpin buy- and sell-side trading requirements, providing a complete solution for options pricing, execution, and risk management. The platform offers access to all major US and European options markets, as well as recently added Indian markets.

Primus needed a flexible range of options trading solutions going forward, which aligned with the different levels of Metro packages that Vela offers depending on the amount of automation required. This allowed the firm to move from one package to another as needs dictated without being forced into a long-term contract.

According to Phillip Gerber, managing partner at Primus Capital, “I felt comfortable using the system in less than a week. The platform has many useful features that all traders will enjoy and strongly enhance profitability. The simplicity of a great trading platform and hosting capabilities allow for a one stop shop.”

Once the decision to move forward was made, Vela’s dedicated account manager worked with Primus and its clearing entity on essential elements for electronic trading, including accounts, pre-trade risk limits and exchange credentials, while also quickly building out the physical and logical deployment.

Primus’ deployment of Metro as a fully managed platform removed the need for the firm to contract with multiple parties in order to access exchange colocation. It also alleviated the need to incur any upfront capital expenditure on hardware, ensuring a fast and seamless onboarding process. The end-to-end implementation, including the home installation of the client software, was completed in just 48 hours.

This rapid deployment allowed Primus to capitalize on trading opportunities during a period of high market volatility. Platform training with the primary trader at Primus began immediately utilizing the remote assistance screen sharing technology that is embedded directly within Metro. The trader was very quickly able to save a layout profile of the software customized for the products he trades and how he trades them.

Primus also made the decision to upgrade to the professional version of the Metro software in order to utilize the Electronic Eye capabilities of the Target Finder and make electronic markets efficiently with auto quoting.

Subscribe to our newsletter

Related content

WEBINAR

Upcoming Webinar: Enhancing trader efficiency with interoperability – Innovative solutions for automated and streamlined trader desktop and workflows

17 September 2025 10:00am ET | 3:00pm London | 4:00pm CET Duration: 50 Minutes Traders today are expected to navigate increasingly complex markets using workflows that often lag behind the pace of change. Disconnected systems, manual processes, and fragmented user experiences create hidden inefficiencies that directly impact performance and risk management. Firms that can streamline...

BLOG

Enhancing Trader Efficiency: Interoperability, Automation, and the Path to Smarter Desktops

In the face of intensifying demands on trading desks, the pressure to streamline workflows and enhance productivity has never been greater. So how can trading firms modernise the trader desktop without creating disruption? What’s the real return on investment for low-code, no-code, and interoperability tools? And how do firms balance build-versus-buy decisions when designing next-generation...

EVENT

TradingTech Briefing New York

Our TradingTech Briefing in New York is aimed at senior-level decision makers in trading technology, electronic execution, trading architecture and offers a day packed with insight from practitioners and from innovative suppliers happy to share their experiences in dealing with the enterprise challenges facing our marketplace.

GUIDE

AI in Capital Markets: Practical Insight for a Transforming Industry – Free Handbook

AI is no longer on the horizon – it’s embedded in the infrastructure of modern capital markets. But separating real impact from inflated promises requires a grounded, practical understanding. The AI in Capital Markets Handbook 2025 provides exactly that. Designed for data-driven professionals across the trade life-cycle, compliance, infrastructure, and strategy, this handbook goes beyond...