FX NOTEBOOK: Trading Volumes Flat in April

Spot trading in foreign exchange fell $1 billion to $130 billion a day in April on Thomson Reuters platforms. Bank of America Merrill Lynch makes hires from Goldman, J.P. Morgan. Court freezes assets of firm for misappropriating funds in an off-exchange trading pool. SBI picks up SmartTrade trading platform.

THOMSON REUTERS: Spot trading in foreign exchange fell $1 billion to $130 billion a day in April on Thomson Reuters platforms.

Volume on Thomson Reuters Dealing, Matching and Reuters Trading for FX had been $131 billion a day in March, the company reported Wednesday.

In April 2012, the platforms also handled $130 billion a day.

On FXall, the electronic platform Thomson Reuters purchased last year, average daily volumes fell to $108 billion in April from $110 billion in March. But Reuters reported volumes were up 21 percent from the $89 billion a day of trading handled in April 2012.

A competitor, EBS, reported said it handled $128.3 billion worth of trading each day in April, up 7 percent from March.

Thomson Reuters also said it will provide real-time interbank foreign exchange data for the onshore and offshore renminbi market through its Eikon financial markets information service.

Investors using the desktop system will receive RMB FX spot, forward and swap prices, historical trade volumes, as well as foreign currency pairs data.

BANK OF AMERICA: Bank of America Merrill Lynch has moved Tom Gillie, co-head of G-10 foreign exchange trading in New York, to Hong Kong to work in its foreign exchange business in the Asia-Pacific region, according to FX Week.

The firm also has hired Jim Coulton from Goldman Sachs to be head of global rates and currencies for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, based n London. Coulton was head of emerging markets foreign exchange trading at Goldman Sachs, before he departed in March after 15 years at the bank.

Also, Huilin Tan and Weng Khong Wong will join the bank at the end of May as directors in institutional FX sales in Singapore, FX Week reported. Tan will manage a portfolio of central banks, real-money investors and hedge funds, while Wong will focus on hedge funds. Both come from J.P. Morgan.

CFTC: The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission said a court order has frozen the assets of David Prescott and Cambridge Currency Partners. Prescott, the regulator said, solicited individuals to invest in an off-exchange foreign currency pool and then misappropriating their monies. According to its complaint, Prescott misappropriated at least $455,000 of pool participants’ monies, using some of those funds for air travel, hotel accommodations, and gambling.

Additionally, the complaint alleges Prescott failed to inform participants and prospective participants that under the name of David Weeks, he previously had been convicted of conspiracy to commit securities fraud, mail fraud and wire fraud, and perjury, and had been ordered to pay restitution of over $1 million to defrauded investors and was permanently enjoined from violating the anti-fraud provisions of the Securities Exchange Act.

SMARTTRADE: SmartTrade Technologies said the SBI Liquidity Market in Japan will use its LiquidityFX trading system.

SBI will use the liquidity aggregation service and smart order routing to speed response and improve execution for banks, brokers, asset managers and hedge funds.