Continuing our reporting on record FX trading volumes seen at institutional eFX platforms on Friday after the Brexit vote sent the currency markets is a tizzy, Gain Capital Holdings Inc (NYSE:GCAP) has reported that GTX, its institutional foreign exchange trading arm, set a record trading volume of $24.2 billion (single count) on Friday June 24, 2016.
The new record eclipses the previous $17.8 billion record set January 29, 2016.
By comparison, GTX averaged just under $10 billion traded per day in May.
The three most actively traded currency pairs on GTX during the period were GBP/USD, EUR/USD, and USD/JPY.
GTX reported that the extreme market volatility Friday prompted heavy use of the ECN’s Request-for-Stream (RFS) block trading mechanism, which clients used to execute trades of greater than 20 million in a single transaction with a single liquidity provider.
In addition, clients posted bids and offers on the ECN to trade passively, which enabled them to avoid paying the unusually wide bid/offer spreads prevailing in the market during the hours leading up to and following the outcome of the referendum.
The day’s overall record volume included ECN volume of $19.9 billion and a higher-than-average volume of $4.3 billion executed via the registered swap dealer. The swap dealer provides agency execution services primarily for covered products, including forwards, NDFs, options and swaps.
“We were gratified to see clients use a range of GTX platforms and services as well as active and passive execution tactics to adapt to the extreme market conditions,” said Vincent Sangiovanni, CEO, GTX. “This diverse approach validates GTX’s “ecosystem” strategy, providing electronic platforms, agency execution and prime services to support trading of all FX products under different market conditions.”
“Our active liquidity management service is a key differentiator of GTX for both market takers and makers within our ECN environment, and the liquidity and execution quality available within the venue during this highly volatile period underscores that advantage for our clients, said Steve Reilly, Global Head of Liquidity. “Our key bank and non-bank liquidity providers made robust markets throughout this monumental day.”