Brokerage

Founded in 1987, GFI provides competitive inter-dealer brokerage services in a multitude of global over-the-counter (“OTC”) cash and derivatives markets, including credit derivatives and fixed income, financial derivatives, cash equities and equity derivatives, energy and commodities.  GFI is an industry leader in various credit, financial, equity and commodity markets according to recent market surveys published by Risk and Energy Risk magazines.

Headquartered in New York, GFI employs more than 1,700 people with additional offices in London, Paris, Hong Kong, Seoul, Tokyo, Singapore, Sydney, Cape Town, Dubai, Tel Aviv, Dublin, Calgary, Englewood (NJ) and Sugar Land (TX). GFI provides services and products to over 2,400 institutional clients, including leading banks, corporations, insurance companies and hedge funds.

In addition to being instrumental in fostering standardization and liquidity in OTC credit derivatives markets, GFI continues to take a leadership role in providing intermediation in new derivative product classes, such as freight, weather and property derivatives and we are a leader in service global markets for greenhouse gas emissions trading.

GFI is a member of the Wholesale Markets Brokers' Association (WMBA) and the WMBA Americas, an independent industry body representing the largest inter-dealer brokers (IDBs) operating in the North American wholesale.

Technology

Our technology strategy is to combine hybrid electronic and broker-assisted brokerage with proprietary analytical tools and tradable market data. We use technological innovation to more effectively deliver higher-value services to our customers and to increase our market share while improving broker productivity.

Examples of our achievements to date include CreditMatch®, which has become a leading trading platform in Europe for credit derivatives and cash bonds, GFI ForexMatch™ for currency derivatives and EnergyMatch®, an electronic trading platform for emissions products in North America.  These platforms combine pre-trade analytical, execution and post-trade straight-through-processing (“STP”) capabilities with both CreditMatch® and GFI ForexMatch™ receiving recognition from Financial News and FX Week, respectively, as leading trading platforms in their markets.

In January 2008, we significantly enhanced our technology offerings in commodity and financial products with the acquisition of Trayport Ltd., along with its world-class GlobalVision electronic platform, which can accommodate electronic trading, information sharing and STP.  Trayport is the leading provider of trading software in the European energy markets and is used by brokers, exchanges and trading counterparties.

GFI is a member of the International Securities Exchange, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the London Stock Exchange, the European Energy Exchange, Eurex, Euronext.Liffe, Xetra, SWX Europe and the Baltic Exchange.

Market Data

Demands for market transparency and new accounting standards are challenging participants in the derivatives markets. As an independent intermediary in highly specialized markets, GFI can assist the buy- and sell-sides by providing them with hard to find, independent and comprehensive real time and historical data. The presence of brokerage operations in such specialized markets means that GFI is an important information hub of complex derivative products, and therefore ideally positioned to provide the capital markets with data which reflects actual market conditions and sentiments. GFI makes it its data available through FTP file downloads, FENICS analytics and third-party data vendors. Each channel is tailored to suit front, middle or back office requirements.

Currently available data sets include: FX options, credit derivatives, energy & commodities, equity options.

GFI FENICS® Analytics

GFI is a market leader in providing pricing and risk management tools. Its GFI FENICS® product range covers FX options, property derivatives, wet and dry freight derivatives and certain precious metals.

GFI FENICS® draws on FENICS’ knowledge and experience gained from over 20 years of providing intuitive price discovery software to currency derivative markets. Its ability to deliver powerful and accurate price discovery and revaluation is boosted by GFI’s presence as an important independent intermediary in OTC markets. GFI supports its GFI FENICS® analytics with an abundance of independent market data sourced directly from GFI’s trading systems.