The London Stock Exchange Group has appointed the chairman of the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) and the chief risk officer at Deutsche Bank to its board.
ISDA's Stephen O'Connor and Deutsche's Stuart Lewis join as non-executive directors from 18 July, while Janet Cohen, Sergio Ermotti and Gay Huey Evans step down.
According to LSEG, the appointment of members with credit and market risk experience reflects the growing role of post-trade and risk management in the group's business.
Lewis has held senior roles at Deutsche Bank since 1996, and also worked in credit risk management at Credit Suisse Financial Products. O'Connor has been chairman of ISDA since 2011. He worked at Morgan Stanley in London and New York, where he held a number of positions, including head of OTC derivative clearing.
Meanwhile, in the US, Nasdaq OMX has promoted Tom Wittman to run its three US stock exchanges, adding to his role of running the company's options business.
The appointment is part of a boarder management move to diversify, as stock-trading volumes have been declining in recent years.
Nasdaq in April announced it would buy eSpeed, an electronic Treasuries-trading platform for US treasury notes and bonds, and bought a 25% stake in TOM, a Dutch alternative trading system focused on options.
Aligning markets
Herbie Skeete, managing director at exchange information provider Mondo Visione, said the latest appointments at LSEG and Nasdaq reflected the organisations' goals to align to the direction of the markets.
"To have a cash equities business and a derivatives business no longer makes sense," he said. "You have to have a unified product around the world and try to see the world as your customers see it, which is probably what Nasdaq is trying to do."
Skeete said in the case of LSEG, the exchange was trying to make strides in the derivatives market - "it's going to be a long haul."
The purchase of clearing house LCH.Clearnet, which was to be finalised in the coming quarter, did help progress.
"LSEG is boosting their expertise at board level in areas that are going to become more important for them, like risk, post-trade and derivatives," he said.