Equiduct, the start-up trading window that aims to take advantage of the best execution requirements of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID) by providing a single point of entry to exchanges, “systematic internalisers” and other trading platforms, says it has secured funding and hired a COO.
Equiduct has completed its first round of funding with the support of the Belgium based Bams Angels Fund and a group of London based industry professionals.
The company has also appointed Willy Van Stappen as Chief Operating Officer, responsible for leading the introduction of a range of MiFID-compliant best execution services to enable firms to trade instruments listed across 29 European countries through a single venue.
Van Stappen joins from LCH.Clearnet, the central counterparty clearing group. He was the Programme Director responsible for the Equities Integration and Equities Harmonization programme at LCH.Clearnet SA, Member and Chairman (2001) of the European Association of Central Counterparty Clearing Houses and COO of Belfox (1990-2000), the Brussels Options & Futures Exchange.
Simultaneously, Equiduct has strengthened its Board of Directors with the addition of Rob Kuijpers, previously Executive Chairman of SN Brussels Airlines and CEO of DHL Worldwide Express and Patrick de Bellefroid, previously Chairman of Puilaetco (a Belgian private bank).
Equiduct says it aims to guarantee execution at the lowest cost and at the best price in a less than 10 milliseconds of turn-around time.
“We are delighted that Willy will be strengthening our Equiduct management team,” says Bob Fuller, CEO of Equiduct. “He brings a vast experience of the European equities market, particularly in the important clearing and settlements market, and is ideally placed to help Equiduct bring its innovative best execution services to market in the run-up to MiFID becoming law in November this year.”
According to Dr Jos Peeters, Chairman of Equiduct, Equiduct has created significant market interest. “We are delighted to complete our first round of funding enabling us to expand our technology staff and prepare for the planned launch of our market data services in Q3 2007 and trading services in Q1 2008,” he says. “We expect to complete our second round of funding during the second quarter of 2007.”
Through Equiduct, organisations will be able to use a single pan-European exchange – rather than having to trade in all 29 national exchanges – and so find it easier to comply with the MiFID goal of creating a level playing field for Europe’s trading venues.
Equiduct claims to offer a speed of less than 10 millisecond turnaround time and is committed to providing customers with very low latency SLA backed end-to-end connections. It is also promising to reduce costs for connectivity, trading and clearing and settlement. Equiduct guarantees execution, and delivery of “provable pan-European best price.”