TECHNOLOGY : Quotron’s New System to Speed Money Trades
Quotron Systems, the Los Angeles-based financial data unit of New York’s Citicorp, is expected today to unveil a product to help currency traders handle more information on transactions more easily and quickly.
Quotron, which has struggled through layoffs and losses, has begun moving into new markets, including foreign exchange, because of declining market share in its core business of stock market data. The new product will challenge foreign exchange data systems offered by Reuters, the industry’s longtime leader, and Telerate.
The Quotron F/X Trader will help traders manage the information they receive from other bank trading desks via direct data systems or telephones. The product, which will use standard IBM workstation hardware and operating software, is intended to enable a foreign exchange trader to transact business with as many as six others simultaneously.
The product uses preprogrammed keys and a system of color “icons” to allow traders to send price quotes and buy or sell orders as quickly as possible. It also lets traders type in their own messages to other traders when a preprogrammed message isn’t suitable.
Features include color clock “icons” that quickly inform a dealer how much time has elapsed since a bid was made.
Twenty large banks have been conducting final tests of the system, and 350 have signed non-binding letters of intent to purchase the F/X Trader. Test banks include Citibank, Chase Manhattan, Manufacturers Hanover Trust, Midland Bank and Chemical Bank.
The F/X Trader has been in development since 1987. About 15 Quotron employees developed the product in a process that began with consultations with traders at a number of major banks. Kenneth A. Hines Jr., Quotron’s vice president of foreign exchange, described the project as a “very major” new initiative.
Analysts have said Quotron has yielded no profit since Citicorp acquired it in 1986. Last October, it laid off 400 employees, or 16% of its work force.
The company’s share of the stock quote business, once 60%, has dwindled as competition has increased. At a recent press conference, Citicorp Chairman John Reed said Quotron would be out of the red by the mid-1990s and begin to rebound as new services are introduced.
