Turquoise, a pan-European trading platform, received authorisation from the UK’s financial regulator, the Financial Services Authority (FSA), on Thursday to operate as a multilateral trading facility. The trading platform is planning a limited launch on August 15, with full trading available in early September. “This is very exciting for us,” said Adrian Farnham, Turquoise’s chief operating officer, speaking at an event hosted by The Financial Services Club, a networking group for financial services executives, in London on Thursday.
The firm also received its MiFID ‘passport’ on the same day. “We are now passported to deliver trading services in Europe,” said Farnham.
When it opens for business on August 15, Turquoise will trade five securities in three markets – a total of 15 stocks. Two weeks later this will rise to 70 stocks. By early September, the complete range of 300 stocks on its displayed (‘lit’) order book and 1,200 stocks on its non-displayed (‘dark’) order book will be available.
For transactions on its lit order book, Turquoise will charge 0.35 basis points (bps) for an aggressive trade, and will pay a rebate of 0.15 bps for a passive trade. It will charge 0.10 bps for both types of trades on auction, and 0.50 bps for both types of trades on its dark book.
When it launches, Turquoise will not offer onward routing, unlike some of its rivals. However, because of demand from smaller broker members, it is planning to implement this. “By the first quarter next year we will have a vanilla onward routing product,” said Farnham.