Liquidnet, an institutional trading and equities network, has acquired analytics platform OTAS Technologies, part of the group’s ongoing efforts to improve its execution capabilities and buy-side trading decision-making processes, per a group statement.
The London Summit 2017 is coming, get involved!
OTAS Technologies enables actionable market intelligence and context, which caters to a wide range of institutional traders and portfolio managers. Its industry-leading analytics and market insight will be assimilated into Liquidnet’s Virtual High Touch decision-support Trading Platform , ultimately helping foster improved buy-side trader decision making and control mechanisms.
The group was launched back in 2011 and has since forged itself into a next-generation analytics provider, promoting trader intelligence. Presently, more than sixty financial institutions currently access the OTAS platform, including several OMS and EMS providers.
The acquisition comes at a key juncture for the institutional trading landscape, which has been undergoing a rapid metamorphosis as new regulations have shifted responsibility for justifying best execution to the buy side. Ultimately, the dynamic nature of the regulatory playing field has also been complicated due to real-time market dynamics and market fragmentation. The acquisition will help Liquidnet better cater to this changing field.
Rob Laible
According to Rob Laible, Liquidnet’s Global Head of Equity Strategy, in a statement on the acquisition: “The biggest challenges we hear from our buy-side Members today center on two things – finding the Liquidity they need, and being able to sort through vast amounts of market information to access what’s relevant. Our goal with this acquisition is to bring OTAS’s analytics into the Liquidnet platform and deliver market context directly to the trader at the point of execution.”
“The need to fill this void in the trader’s toolkit is further underscored by the added best execution requirements under MiFID II. We believe that a firm that incorporates OTAS analytics and our VHT platform into their trading strategy will be able to show a process and commitment to consistently achieving best execution for each and every order,” Mr. Laible added.
“By joining with Liquidnet, we are helping clients achieve their performance objective by delivering a more complete trader intelligence platform that can help address all parts of the trading process: finding liquidity; measuring potential trade impact; monitoring marketing conditions; and now supporting a best execution strategy on an order-by-order level,” explained Tom Doris, CEO of OTAS Technologies.
