Institutional clients of agency broker Instinet Europe can now access Equiduct Systems' HybridBook pan-European trading platform, following the successful completion of testing. HybridBook is an open order book that charges for aggressive orders and rebates passive orders that are executed against. Equiduct claims that HybridBook executes trades at 2-3 milliseconds roundtrip latency.
Instinet clients will be able to access HybridBook, with the liquidity it offers in UK, French, Belgian, Dutch, Portuguese and German stocks, using Instinet's Execution Experts algorithmic suite and the broker's SmartRouter order routing system.
“In Europe, Instinet's SmartRouter and algorithms access more than 40 exchanges, multilateral trading facilities (MTFs) and broker-operated dark pools, and we are pleased to announce Equiduct as the latest venue,” said Richard Balarkas, CEO of Instinet Europe. “Our approach to liquidity sourcing is 100% aligned with our clients' interests and their goal of finding the best liquidity available. We never compromise that goal by preferencing venues based on our costs of trading or the rebates offered.”
Commenting on the announcement, Peter Randall, CEO of Equiduct Systems, added, “We are delighted that a broker with the international stature of Instinet has connected to our pan-European liquidity. Our specialist model, which allows European retail liquidity to interact with professional flows, is proving to be a fast-growing segment of the wider European equity markets. We are confident that access to our liquidity will offer price improvement opportunities for Instinet's global client base.”
Separately Stuart Rutherford has been appointed co-head of sales at Equiduct reporting to Randall.
Rutherford joins Equiduct Systems from now defunct MTF Nasdaq OMX Europe. Prior to this, he was head of trading services at small- to mid-cap exchange PLUS Markets Group and spent 12 years at Merrill Lynch in senior positions in retail order execution and institutional electronic trading.
Across its business Equiduct has seen trading volumes leap over the last month, with turnover up from approximately €100 million per week at the start of October to €331 million for the week ending 29 October.
Equiduct Systems is the operator of the regulated market of the Börse Berlin and is majority owned by Citadel Securities; US broker Knight Capital took a stake the firm In June this year.