Dark pool operator Liquidnet has hired two senior executives, filling the positions of chief operating officer and head of U.S. equity sales and trading.
Liquidnet named John Kelly to the new position of chief operating officer. He also fills a spot on the firm’s leadership team. Kelly, a 30-year veteran, is responsible for driving revenue across all of Liquidnet’s businesses globally and will be based in New York.
The firm also named Lugene Forte as U.S. head of sales and trading operations. Forte, a 25-year veteran, will oversee the U.S. equities business. She replaces Alfred Eskandar, the former head of U.S. equities, who resigned in December.
According to spokesperson Melissa Kanter, Liquidnet decided to create the COO position in order to centralize control and to better coordinate its global businesses.
“With John’s industry and leadership experience, we will be able to execute on the strategy we have already set forth to create a more efficient market for all participants, while having the ability to pursue new growth opportunities that leverage the global institutional trading platform that we have built,” Kanter said.
During the last six years, Kelly worked with former Goldman Sach president John Thornton, providing strategic advisory services to private investors. Earlier, he held several senior positions at Societe Generale in the U.S., including head of capital markets, chief operating officer of the U.S. investment banking business and head of portfolio management for SG Americas. He also worked for Bear Stearns, where he was head of Asian fixed income capital markets.
He reports to chief executive Seth Merrin.
Prior to Liquidnet, Forte worked in the brokerage industry, including spending her last three years as a senior vice president of transition services and of algorithmic trading services at Investment Technology Group.
Before ITG, she co-founded and was chief operating officer at First Principle, an institutional fixed income broker-dealer. She has also done stints at BNY Brokerage where she was managing director of client and product management and was head of institutional sales for Autranet, Inc., an independent research subsidiary of Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette. (DLJ was sold to Credit Suisse in 2000. Autranet was later sold to Bank of New York in 2002.)
Forte reports to the newly hired Kelly.
