Dresdner Kleinwort to Go Live on RTEx

LONDON—Dresdner Kleinwort is slated to go live on Reuters Trading for Exchanges (RTEx) as a liquidity provider next month, an official at the bank says.

The German investment bank will utilize the FIX Protocol to receive orders from buy-side users of RTEx, says Fabian Somerville-Cotton, head of listed products at Dresdner Kleinwort.

Reuters announced last week that RTEx has gone live in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. RTEx is an electronic trading capability for professionals dealing in exchange traded markets. Institutional investors and dealers can discover the price of an instrument and select from a range of brokers offering trade execution and clearing services, from their Reuters desktop. RTEx is available via a number of Reuters existing desktop services including Reuters 3000 Xtra, Reuters Trader for Commodities and Reuters Trader. RTEx is expected to go live in Asia in 2007.

The product has gone live at Barclays Capital, Deutsche Bank, Fimat International Banque, and Bear Stearns. Calyon Financial, HSBC, JPMorgan, Rabo Securities and SEB Futures will go live before the end of the year, according to Reuters officials.

"We have a similar outlook on how to grow our business through a multi-asset class strategy," says Somerville-Cotton.

"As clients diversify in the way they access the market, using FIX connectivity, graphical user interfaces (GUIs) or even traditional telephone broking, Reuters represents another route to market," Somerville-Cotton says. "Many clients are familiar with the Reuters terminal and now clients can click on a price and get exchange connectivity, coupled with STP," he says. "It's also [convenient] for them if they don't want to install another trading platform."

Reuters users can gain access to all the exchanges where Dresdner Kleinwort has a membership "or have connectivity to, as they would be using our own platform," Somerville-Cotton says. "We will potentially reach a broader client base and have relationships with people we did not have access to before," he says. Dresdner Kleinwort is a direct member of 13 exchanges. However, the firm can trade on any exchange through different ties and relationships.

"RTEx is all about linking up the sell side to the buy side," Steve Wilson, head of the electronic trading product development at Reuters told DWT in a previous interview. "Investment banks have great strength in New York, Europe and Asia. … While they can deploy heavyweight technology to their main clients, it's not cost-effective for the next tier down, especially in equities," Wilson says (DWT, March 13).