Quick Releases

Lava Trading, a subsidiary of Citigroup, will introduce an interbank foreign exchange trading platform. The new offering, built upon Lava's proprietary technology, will provide the interbank community with a variety of sophisticated order types, full depth of book and functionality for electronic FX trading, Lava says, adding that it will allow banks to shift large positions among themselves within a "blind" system.

"Lava's platform will provide unique functions and advanced order types, and superior methods of harvesting liquidity, providing the interbank community with offerings that are used extensively on the buy side," said David Ogg, CEO of LavaFX, in a release. The platform will be available via the Internet or leased lines later this year.

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BNY Brokerage, a subsidiary of The Bank of New York, has formed a new unit to provide the hedge fund community with electronic trading tools, commission management services and independent research. The new unit will handle sales, marketing and trading, and will be led by Mark Perdigao, managing director, formerly of the firm's institutional sales group.

"Hedge funds are increasingly receptive to our ability to deliver comprehensive, conflict-free brokerage solutions with sophisticated trading tools, customized and specialized research, and transparency in commission pricing within an agency-based model," said Carey Pack, president of BNY Brokerage, in a release. "This new unit will help us concentrate more resources on meeting the specialized needs of this rapidly growing market segment."