News
BoA sells Canada corp arm
TORONTO -- FX services group Travelex has bought part of Bank of America’s corporate forex business in Canada.
CLS settlement "100% on time"
NEW YORK -- Despite some disruptions, trade settlement on the new Continuous Linked Settlement (CLS) service for FX has seen 100% ‘on-time’ performance since its September 9 launch.
Italian team snubs Merrill
LONDON -- A three-strong Italian FX sales team backtracked on a move to Merrill Lynch to rejoin Goldman Sachs in London last week.
Deutsche adds to e-FX
NEW YORK -- Deutsche Bank plans to add FX options, futures and exchange-for-physical contracts to its FX electronic trading and order management platform, autobahnFX, by the third quarter.
Dollar bloc upsurge boosts Australian forex turnover
SYDNEY -- Increasing interest in Australian dollar trading is boosting Australian banks’ forex turnover, senior market participants told FX Week .
BarCap lures top dealers
LONDON -- Barclays Capital is in the midst of an aggressive recruitment campaign in London and New York, targeting staff at the world’s top investment banks.
Regulators approve Allfirst purchase
NEW YORK -- Federal and state regulators have approved M&T Bank’s purchase of Allied Irish Banks’ US subsidiary Allfirst Financial -- the bank that last February discovered it had lost nearly $700 million from fraudulent FX trading.
Goldman down, Bear Stearns up in Q1 forex
NEW YORK -- Goldman Sachs last week reported reduced forex revenues within its fixed-income, currency and commodities (FICC) division for Q1, although other US investment banks fared better.
Payments banks in CLS lead
NEW YORK -- Banks with traditionally strong payments businesses are winning the race for CLS third-party clients, according to consultancy Capco.
ACI postpones Beirut meeting
BEIRUT -- The biennial meeting of the forex industry organised by ACI-The Financial Markets Association, has been postponed until September 10--14, the ACI announced last week.
ECB highlights dangers of over-concentrated market
FRANKFURT -- Market consolidation and a reliance on electronic trading could lead to an over-concentration of risk and liquidity among too few market participants, the European Central Bank has warned.
Trading places
BNP Paribas boosts FX sales
Rumours hit jumpy FX markets
LONDON -- FX markets starved of certainty saw some price movement last week, mostly on the back of unconfirmed rumours regarding the war in Iraq.
Citigroup’s Englander joins BarCap but top research post stays vacant
LONDON -- Brian Martin, global head of FX research at Barclays Capital in London, has left the bank.
CBA takes SunGard’s eGT
SYDNEY -- Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) has gone live with SunGard Trading Systems/Front’s eGlobalTrader (eGT), a browser-based dealer distribution system, for front-office deal capture in FX and money markets.
AIG hires ex-Commerzbank options dealers in London
LONDON -- Former Commerzbank FX options dealers Behnouche Mostachfi and Damian Zihlman have joined AIG Trading in London, a spokesperson for the firm told FX Week . Both report to Greenwich-based global head of FX options and head of FX Donald Lee.
Refco signs up Future Dynamics
CHICAGO -- US broker Refco has signed up derivatives software firm Future Dynamics to develop customised clearing products for its clients globally.
FXall opens office in Singapore
SINAGPORE -- Multi-bank FX trading portal FXall has opened an office in Singapore, the firm said last week.
ACM grows FX volumes
GENEVA -- Online FX trading firm AC Markets (ACM) traded over $8 billion in February, despite only launching in November last year, a senior official at the firm told FX Week .
Merrill extends SuperDerivatives use
LONDON -- Merrill Lynch has renewed its licence to use SuperDerivatives’ currency options pricing system, SuperDerivatives said last week.
Forex dealers desert Pru-Bache
LONDON -- Spot euro dealer Mark Davison will leave Prudential Bache, the international arm of US-based Prudential Securities, in London next month, a spokesperson for the firm in New Jersey told FX Week .
Forex downturn hits US wages
NEW YORK -- Market stagnation has resulted in near flat foreign exchange wages for dealers in the US, with senior managers receiving increases less than the yearly inflation rate, according to a report made public earlier this month.