BIDS Trading (Block Interest Discovery Service), the newly formed alternative trading system (ATS) designed to increase competition and liquidity in the U.S. equity block trading market, has named industry veteran Richard Levin as general counsel, chief compliance officer and secretary to the board of directors.
In this position, Levin will be responsible for managing BIDS’ legal, regulatory and compliance matters. He will also work closely with U.S. regulators to ensure that BIDS fulfils all regulatory requirements.
The BIDS platform, which offers customisable tools to allow end-users to successfully negotiate block trades, is expected to launch in spring 2007.
“Richard will play a leading role in BIDS’ effort to provide traders with a unique, alternative liquidity source in the block trading market,” says BIDS’ CEO, Timothy Mahoney. “Richard’s extensive experience with market structure issues will be of tremendous importance as BIDS seeks to improve market efficiency and reduce transaction costs through the BIDS platform.”
Prior to joining BIDS, Levin served as general counsel, chief compliance officer and secretary to the board of directors, EquiLend Holdings. Richard was part of the original management team that launched the securities finance joint venture of eleven leading financial services firms, including Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch and UBS. In this role, he was responsible for all legal, regulatory and compliance matters associated with the firm’s US and UK broker-dealer and ATS subsidiaries, including US, UK, Japanese, and Canadian regulators.
“I am excited to be part of the team behind this new venture,” says Levin. “As we move towards the launch date, I look forward to BIDS achieving its goal of creating a deep liquidity pool for all market participants to anonymously trade large block orders,” he adds.
Levin has also served as general counsel of NexTrade Holdings, the owner and operator of the NexTrade ECN which was acquired in 2006 by Citigroup, and as assistant general counsel and regulatory affairs officer of Knight Trading Group. While at Knight, Levin represented Nasdaq’s largest market maker before the SEC, the NASD, Nasdaq, and UK regulators.