The next merger or acquisition involving the operator of exchanges in North America and Scandinavia could come in foreign exchange, where it could apply its high-speed trading technology. Also: EBS picks new chiefs, FXCM sees burst of institutional activity and more.
EBS: The electronic foreign exchange trading business of interdealer broker ICAP said it appointed Nichola Hunter and John Schoen as co-heads of the EBS Market platform, effective immediately.
Hunter and Schoen will be responsible for continued development of the platform and oversee EBS Market product.
EBS Market is the new name for the business’s original, flagship anonymous EBS platform, used by approximately 2,800 professional traders in 50 countries.
“The EBS Market is a fitting name for a platform that has been and continues to be widely regarded as the leading source of benchmark pricing for the global FX market,’’ said chief executive Gil Mandelzi.
FXCM: The company said institutional trading volume per day of $6.6 billion in February 2013 was 25% higher than in January 2013 and 8% higher than in February 2012.
That constituted 17,888 institutional client trades per day in February 2013, 13% higher than January 2013 and 39% lower than February 2012.
“2013 has so far been a very different year than 2012, with two of our best months of volume ever in January and February,” said chief executive Drew Niv, FXCM’s Chief Executive Officer.
The provider of online foreign exchange trading services said revenue in the fourth quarter of 2012 reached $108.1 million, down from $108.1 million a year earlier. Net income fell to $3.0 million, from $3.2 million.
For the year, revenue increased to $417.3 million, from $415.6 million. Net cinome fell to $9.0 million, from $12.7 million.
Nasdaq OMX: The next merger or acquisition involving the operator of exchanges in North America and Scandinavia could come in foreign exchange.
At a conference run by Raymond James & Associates, chief financial officer Lee Shavel said “we don’t see the likelihood for large-scale exchange M&A” under current industry and economic conditions.
But, he said, Nasdaq could bring its technology to bear in foreign exchange or fixed-income markets, instead.
“We do look at evolving markets, like the foreign exchange market, like fixed income, where we think the trends are going to continue to be influenced by technology adoption and electronic trading that may drive opportunities for us to leverage our infrastructure,’’ Shavel said. “So I think those are the areas where we continue to be focused from an M&A standpoint.”
ITM Financial: The company said its foreign exchange signaling software will be available to binary options traders starting March 18.
Binary options come in two distinct forms, cash-or-nothing binary options or asset-or-nothing binary options. “We think the next movement it the options space will be the continued growth of the binary option markets as more and more traders use the options to hedge currency pairs and commodities like gold, oil, and gas,” said Ali Khan, CTO of ITM Financial.
The move comes fix weeks before ITM Financial launches a separate program for the U.S. stock market.
FENICS Software: The subsidiary of GFI Group said post-trade processor Traiana will integrate FENICS Professional with its Harmony TR Connect and CCP Connect software. This integration will allow FENICS customers to manage the reporting of over-the-counter FX derivatives into swaps data repositories and clearing houses.
These will include the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation Swaps Data Repository (SDR), Global Trade Repository (GTR) and other trade repositories required globally by regulators.
Under the agreement, Fenics customers will be able to submit reportable FX trades (including options, deliverable forwards, non-deliverable forwards and swaps) to repositories via the TR Connect service as well as receive relevant trade details back.
