THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

Deutsche Börse Group monitors & timestamps trades with Metamako

The exchange upgrades network technology for improved data capture, network monitoring and precision timestamping of its colocation datacenter.

16 January 2018, Frankfurt, London & New York:  Metamako, the leading provider of intelligent, FPGA-enabled  network platforms, is providing its technology to Deutsche Börse Group . The exchange is using the company’s network devices to increase the accuracy, speed and precision of data capture, network monitoring and timestamping of its co-location network. Every trade is now monitored by a Metamako device, making it an integral part of the Deutsche Börse infrastructure. The deployment pertains to its 2017 network upgrade of the Eurex and Xetra markets.

The exchange is deploying Metamako’s K-Series network devices running MetaWatch, an ultra-precise tapping and timestamping application, which gives the exchange unprecedented insight into the customer-facing part of its network. It also gives Deutsche Börse the ability to accurately record and recreate all trading activity to ensure fairer market access for participants along with enabling real-time troubleshooting.

Andreas Lohr, Derivatives and Cash Trading IT at Deutsche Börse Group, says: “We went through a thorough process of evaluating vendors and chose Metamako for a number of reasons. Some of the key considerations were lossless packet capture (even at very high data volumes), nanosecond timestamp precision, in-depth understanding of our industry and responsiveness of the Metamako team.”

Deutsche Börse already had a packet capture and timestamping solution in place. However, with the upgrade of its co-location network in 2017, and in response to increasing demands for fairness and precision, the exchange needed to strengthen and enhance its network monitoring and timestamping capabilities for full visibility of every packet crossing its networks, especially during traffic bursts.

Kevin Covington, CEO of Metamako, says: “This is an important double milestone for Metamako: winning one of the world’s largest and most technically-advanced exchanges is a fantastic achievement, as is getting one of the largest single orders so far, of 60 of our K-Series devices.” He adds, “Trading environments are becoming more challenging to monitor, thanks to ever-increasing data volumes, latencies dropping to nanosecond levels and regulatory pressures. We’re working with several other exchanges in Asia and Australia and I’m delighted that, once again, Metamako has been trusted to provide the solution thanks to innovation, functionality and ROI.”

Since the implementation of Metamako, Deutsche Börse has seen a number of tangible improvements to its network capture and monitoring. Notably, it can now: 

  • Offer clients the most reliable, high-quality trading network.
  • Conduct more precise planning, for example capacity planning.
  • Ensure fair and equal market access for trading participants by precisely timestamping the sequence of incoming orders and quotes.
  • See and analyse every packet and therefore be able to diagnose and recreate any trading event. 

Metamako recently developed a new set of industry benchmarks in conjunction with STAC® (Securities Technology Analysis Center LLC) for measuring timestamp accuracy and time synchronisation.

To read the full case study, click here.