FXall snaps up Citi forex platform
INVESTMENT bank Citi has agreed a deal to sell its electronic foreign exchange platform, LavaFX, to electronic forex platform FXall, it said yesterday.
FXall, which has some 800 institutional clients including large hedge funds and asset management firms, did not disclose the terms of the deal.
The firm said the acquisition, for an undisclosed fee, would boost its client base to 1,000, adding it will take on LavaFX chief executive Tom San Pietro as head of active trading.
FXall chief executive Phil Weisberg said: “We have long admired LavaFX’s innovative client focus on active trading which compliments FXall’s offering for this important client segment.”
Citi, which is a shareholder in FXall in addition to 15 other banks, said in a statement that it “believes a multi-bank platform is best owned by a multi-bank provider, making the sale of LavaFX to FXall the right strategy for its continued growth”.
The bank hopes the sale will provide FXall with the capacity to challenge Reuters and EBS, the providers currently dominating the electronic currency trading market.
FXall was originally launched in 2000 by seven founding banking participants.