Instinet Prepares to Launch Canadian ATS

Ivy Schmerken, Wall Street & Technology

Ramping up its efforts to develop alternative execution venues outside the United States, Instinet plans to launch an alternative trading system (ATS) in Canada, called ICX (Instinet Canada Cross).

The ATS will operate as a continuous, electronic auction market for trading Canadian exchange-listed securities, according to the release. ICX is expected to launch in 2007 and will be operated by Instinet I-X Limited, a soon-to-be registered Canadian investment dealer, pending regulatory approval."In speaking with our Canadian clients, it's clear that there is a rapidly growing demand for fully electronic, off-exchange liquidity sources," stated Tal Cohen, SVP at Instinet. "We believe that ICX will provide a much-needed alternative in the Canadian equity marketplace," added Cohen in the release.

Instinet is "leveraging its deep heritage in the electronic trading" space, commented Alex Goor, co-president at Instinet, in the release. "We expect the resulting increase in transaction speed at significantly lower cost to lead to greater trading volumes and a positive impact on market liquidity and transparency," further stated Goor in the release.

ICX will be based on the same technology and pricing structure as Instinet's soon-to-be-launched Chi-X Pan-European ATS. In October, Instinet announced that it's building a new pan-European Multi-Lateral Trading Facility (MTF) under MiFID, dubbed Instinet Chi-X Limited, to begin trading later this year.

But Instinet isn't the only developer of electronic marketplaces eyeing opportunities to the north. Liquidnet launched Canadian equity trading on Oct. 24. Canadian buy-side institutions joined with Liquidnet's membership of about 400 members to create a new global marketplace for Canadian equity trading, the block trading marketplace said in its release. Ivy is Editor-at-Large for Advanced Trading and Wall Street & Technology. Ivy is responsible for writing in-depth feature articles, daily blogs and news articles with a focus on automated trading in the capital markets. As an industry expert, Ivy has reported on a myriad ... View Full Bio