1977 .................. buys a seat on the American Stock Exchange (AMEX) and becomes a member,
trading as an individual market maker in equity options.
1978 ........ is formed to expand
trading activities to several members under badge number 549. The firm is the first to use computer generated fair value sheets printed daily.
1979 ........ expands to four employees, three of whom are AMEX members.
1980 Plans are made to restructure the operation and to identify price anomalies in several securities at the same time.
1981 Efforts are made to code and test a system that identifies potential delta neutral
trade pairs. Our greatest challenge: how to electronically read the prices of options as they are posted.
1982 .......... is formed. Initially, the company
trades equity options at the AMEX, clearing through Spear, Leeds & Kellogg.
Traders receive telephone instructions identifying pairs and prices.
1983 .............. creates the first handheld computers used for
trading. Their ability to track positions and continually re-price options on one stock quickly gives ...........
traders an advantage over their counterparts at the exchange, who continue to use fair value pricing sheets that are updated only once or twice a day.
................. begins
trading at the Philadelphia Stock Exchange.
........... expands to 12 employees.
1984 ........... begins coding a computerized stock index futures and options
trading system.
........... becomes a member of The Options Clearing Corporation.
1985 In February, ......... new computer system and network is brought online, ushering in a new era of computerized
trading. The system allows ............ to centrally price and manage risk on a portfolio of equity derivatives
traded in multiple locations around the country.
........... becomes a member of the New York Futures Exchange.
............ begins
trading at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), the Chicago Board of Trade and the Chicago Board Options Exchange.
1986 :............ becomes a member of the Pacific Stock Exchange and the Options Division of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).
The
trading system is reprogrammed to operate on a network of SUN workstations.
The firm's
traders generate a 430% return on equity for the year with the new system.
1987 ............. becomes self-clearing in equities, joining the National Securities Clearing Corp. and the Depository Trust Company.
The stock market crash creates the impetus for cross margining between clearing houses with ............ as a major proponent. (Cross-margining emerges several years later).
............ expands to 67 employees.
1989 ............. becomes a clearing member at the CME.
1990 ........... Deutschland GmbH is incorporated in Germany, and shortly thereafter, begins
trading equity derivatives at the Deutsche Terminborse (DTB), now Eurex. This is ......... first application of its
trading system on a fully automated exchange.
............ becomes one of the leading market makers at the DTB, claiming more than 10% of the
trading volume.
1992 ............ expands its European
trading to the Swiss Options and Financial Futures Exchange (SOFFEX), another fully automated exchange.
.............. expands to 142 employees.
1993 .......... is incorporated in Switzerland and takes over the Group's
trading at SOFFEX.
In the United States, .......... floor
traders begin using commercially available handheld computers on the exchange floors, communicating by radio with the firm's central pricing systems. The hand-helds allow
traders to create electronic trade tickets.
............. is incorporated as a US broker-dealer, making .............. vast intercontinental electronic network and
trade execution services available to customers.
1994 ............. begins
trading at the European Options Exchange in the Netherlands, the OM Exchange in Sweden (an electronic exchange) and the London International Financial Futures and Options Exchange (LIFFE) in the U.K.
........... becomes a member of the electronic Belgian Futures and Options Exchange.
.......... becomes a member of the NYSE and begins executing stock
trades through SuperDot, the electronic order routing system.
............ is regularly named one of the top ten program
traders at the NYSE.
1995 ........ is incorporated and begins making markets at the Paris Traded Equity Options Market and the Marché à Terme International de France futures exchange.
............. begins making markets at the Hong Kong Futures Exchange.
......... expands its activities into the Italian Mercato Italiano Futures and Spanish Meff Renta Variable markets.
1996 ............ doubles the number of underlying stocks that it
trades to more than 800.
.............. is incorporated and begins
trading at the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong.
1997 The Hong Kong Futures Exchange lists stock index futures on an electronic market. ......... is the only committed market maker.
........... begins
trading in Norway and becomes a member of the Austrian Derivatives Exchange.
With strong support from ........., the S&P 500 E-Mini futures becomes the first US electronic market and the most successful futures contract ever introduced.
....... now makes bids and offers for 60,000 items.
..........
trades just less than 5% (15,000 transactions) of the daily volume in listed equity derivatives worldwide. .......... expands to 284 employees.
1998 ...... begins to clear online
trades for retail customers who are connected directly to Globex to
trade S&P futures.
1999 .... provides a "smart routing" linkage for multiple listed equity options.
....... begins to clear online
trades for customers
trading stocks and equity derivatives through the ........ system.
2000 On average, more than six percent of the daily global volume of exchange-
traded equity options and equity futures is now
traded across the .....
In the course of the year, .......... customer base increased nearly 500%.
...... becomes a Primary Market Maker on the ISE (International Securities Exchange), the first fully electronic US options exchange.
2001 The group's combined electronic brokerage and market making firms' volume now exceeds 200,000
trades per day.
Standard & Poor's issues an investment grade rating to ............ For more information on Standard & Poor's visit:
http://www.standardandpoors.com.
2002 ..... the Bourse de Montreal and the Boston Stock Exchange announce the formation of a partnership to create the Boston Options Exchange (BOX).
......... begins electronic market making in Japan.
Application Program Interface (API) introduced which gives customers and third-party developers the ability to directly integrate with the
trading system.
........ becomes the major market maker for the newly introduced US Single Stock Futures.
2003 ................. transacted approximately 12% of the exchange listed equity and index options worldwide.
2004 ........... introduces Direct Access Bond
Trading, Institutional FOREX, Singapore Futures, German Warrants, French and Dutch stocks and options, CBOE Futures and
trading on the Frankfurt/Stuttgart exchanges. Our Intermarket Spread Router searches across all exchanges for the best price on each individual leg of a spread order.
2005 ....... executed over 16% of the world’s options on markets where they actively
traded.
2006 ........ takes stakes in One Chicago, the ISE Stock Exchange, and the CBOE Stock Exchange in its efforts to further innovation in the
trading industry.
2007 On May 3rd ........ sold 40,000,000 shares in a public offering at $30.01 per share.
