Jason Green was named director at BNP Paribas, focused on systematic macro sales following 10 and a half years at Morgan Stanley.  Whilst at Morgan Stanley he most recently served as executive director in electronic FX institutional sales. Before that, Green worked in fixed income derivatives solutions at Barclays Investment Bank. 

Olivia Gassner joined JP Morgan as VP, equity electronic sales trader following a stint at RBC Capital Markets. New York-based Gassner served in the same role at RBC Capital Markets for three years prior to the move. In the past, she worked at Barclays for almost five years, most recently as an associate, equity electronic sales trader. 

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Castel most recently served as a trader focused on equities (cash and swap), foreign exchange, and listed derivatives.

He will begin his new role as of 1 November, based in Denmark, The TRADE understands. 

Castel was one of The TRADE’s Rising Stars of Trading and Execution in 2023, recognised as a budding buy-side talent in the institutional trading space. 

Over the years the Rising Stars initiative, in collaboration with Instinet, has recognised many up-and-coming buy-side talents, several of whom have gone on to head up some of the largest and most successful desks across the world’s leading asset managers and hedge funds.

Candriam declined to comment when approached by The TRADE.

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The levels of trading volumes in European equities are influenced by a complex interplay of various factors like market fragmentation, economic conditions, monetary policy, investor behaviour and market volatility among other things. Market volatility was low across European stock indices in Q1 2024, compared to the same period last year, partly explains lower volumes across European cash and derivatives equity markets. A couple of other important factors which could help increase volumes in Europe would be to encourage the involvement of retail investors in the EU equity markets and, also the growth of small cap businesses, reducing complexity and costs for listing. However, regulators are not the only ones that could quickly help address these complex structural issues in Europe.

What is the role of regulators in addressing fragmentation in Europe – if any?

Market fragmentation has increased over recent years and led to the dispersion of trading activity across primary exchanges, lit and dark multilateral trading facilities (MTFs), banks’ systematic internalisers (SIs) and electronic liquidity providers’ (ELP SIs). The EU regulators have an important role to play to help all equity market participants get a clearer picture of post-trade data across all these execution venues, including to help show consistent flagging of trades and addressable liquidity for all investors in the EU equity markets.

Are central limit order books still fit for purpose?

Central limit order books (CLOBs) across primary exchanges remain a significant part of the trading ecosystem for European equities. CLOBs are still fit for purpose because they facilitate the price formation process in European equity markets for the benefit of all market participants. However, trading equities in CLOBs bring its own challenges, such as the risk of information leakage for the institutional traders who work large-size orders. Depending on portfolio managers’ instructions, orders’ size, liquidity levels and market conditions, deciding where and how to implement investment ideas efficiently has never been more important for institutional traders than in the current market environment.

If not, what is the alternative?

Institutional traders need to have a high level of flexibility and agility for large tickets to navigate the high fragmentation of liquidity in the EU equity markets. Buy-side traders typically use broker-driven smart order routers to access diverse execution venues like CLOBs, dark pools and systematic internalisers’ quotes during continuous market hours. They can also use a high-touch approach to trading blocks in different ways gain access to large pools of liquidity during the closing auction. All these execution venues and trading techniques are necessary and complementary for equity investors, and their relative importance can vary over time, depending again on portfolio managers’ instructions, orders’ size, liquidity levels and market conditions. The evolution towards agility and flexibility has clearly been supported by the new generation of order and execution management systems (OEMS). Real-time transaction cost analysis (TCA) within the OEMS allows buy-side traders to notice anything that might be going wrong during a trade in their system and discuss the execution process with their brokers.

Could a consolidated tape offer up a suitable alternative tool to CLOBs (CT)?

A like-for-like comparison between a consolidated tape for European equities and a CLOB is not really possible. A CT for European equities will likely give access to both consolidated pre- and post-trade data, and a CLOB only refers to pre-trade data. At this stage, there is also little clarity about the pre-trade format that the CT for European equities will eventually take: will it be a CLOB with five levels of order book data or simply the European best bid and offer (EBBO)? Whatever form an EU consolidated tape would take for European equities, it’s important to keep in mind that the CT should primarily be a viable commercial proposition for all stakeholders, and it should also not be too costly for investors.

The post Fabien Oreve: Fixing Europe’s future markets appeared first on The TRADE.

Following the expansion of the partnership, the pair will offer solutions and services to non-US resident investors who invest through US intermediaries. Investors in the US offshore market will be able to access Candriam’s existing UCITS funds that cover US high yield corporate bonds, emerging market equity and debt, and thematic strategies.

In preparation for Candriam’s entry into the new market, New York Life Investments’ sales teams will support introductory conversations with US-based broker dealers and other financial intermediaries.

Candriam’s European trading desks will cover the US offshore market from the Bloc.

“There is a significant opportunity in the US offshore market to match evolving investor demand in these regions with innovative solutions,” said Keith Dixon, head of international development at Candriam.

“International investors are seeking high yielding strategies, along with diversifiers for their portfolios which are increasingly centred on global thematic solutions that take advantage of structural trends. This increases our global coverage and is a natural next step to growing the business.”

Candriam first expanded into the US with a New York office in 2017 as part of its continued partnership with New York Life and IndexIQ.

The New York office accesses US institutional investors through Candriam’s international equity and fixed income strategies, including sustainable and responsible investments.

“Our daily conversations with US advisors enable us to see first-hand how tricky market dynamics are driving their offshore clients to seek new investment ideas; these insights, in turn, empower our sales teams to work closely with intermediaries and platforms to deliver best-in-class solutions to this market segment,” said Jac McLean, head of US distribution at New York Life Investment Management.

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Edouard Petitcollot

Candriam has overhauled its global trading structure in a bid to refocus its attention on more complex and high touch trading strategies, The TRADE can reveal.

The asset manager will now operate with two specialised trading groups, one dedicated to equities, consisting of a team of three traders and headed up by Fabien Orève, and one dedicated to fixed income, consisting of four traders and headed up by Amaury Van Ruymbeke.

Edouard Petitcollot will lead the operation as global head of trading. Fabien Orève will also serve as his deputy alongside his equities focused role.

Amaury van Ruymbeke

According to an internal memo penned by Petitcollot and seen by the TRADE, the restructure is in response to increased demand for more complex and high touch protocols and strategies across high yield and emerging market bonds, small and mid-cap equities, long and short equity, credit strategies, equity block and fixed income portfolio trading.

The new structure is designed to create better proximity between Candriam’s traders and portfolio managers across its branches to offer a more specialised trading service.

“These changes, underpinned by a structured approach, illustrates Candriam’s commitment to aligning its trading desk with the evolving demands of the market,” said Petitcollot in the memo.

“We are confident that this new organisational structure will not only enable us to navigate the dynamic trading landscape efficiently but also foster greater innovation and collaboration across our teams.”

Fabien Orève

The decision follows the merging of the asset manager’s legal subsidiaries in Brussels, London and France to create one Luxembourg-headquartered global trading firm in July last year. The move was designed to create better efficiencies and cost savings across the business. The former subsidiaries are now branches.

Historically, Candriam’s Paris office has specialised in illiquid assets such as high yield and convertible bonds, while its London office has primarily dealt with the emerging markets.

“We’d like to be at the forefront of this new generation of multi asset and get it closer to investment needs and evolution,” Orève told The TRADE.

“High touch trading can be renewed. It’s always been considered old fashioned but that is no longer the case. It’s been reformatted to hybrid and we want to push this new concept through our new organisation focused on investment needs with a high touch flavour in the very strong technological environment.”

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The European Fund and Asset Management Association (EFAMA) has appointed the chief executive officer of Candriam, Naïm Abou-Jaoudé, as its new president.

He joins EFAMA for a two-year term which will run until June 2023 and replaces Nicolas Calcoen, deputy general manager of Amundi.

Abou-Jaoudé has been CEO of Candriam since 2007 after joining the firm from Dexia Asset Management where he had been chief investment officer for alternative investments and a member of the executive committee for seven years.

“I am honoured to represent Europe’s investment management industry, which manages EUR 27 trillion of assets, as EFAMA President. While our industry remains vital to investors in achieving their financial goals, we also now have a critical part to play in encouraging a more sustainable and inclusive future,” said Abou-Jaoudé.

“As we emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic, the importance of this organisation’s work on behalf of our industry could not be more pressing. There is much to do and helping Europe to transition into a low carbon economy and build back better will be a top priority of mine.”

Chief investment officer of APG Investment Managers, Peter Branner, and global chief operation officer of Natixis Investment Managers, Joseph Pinto, have been appointed as vice presidents to Abou-Jaoudé.

They join EFAMA at a pivotal period in the market amid regulatory uncertainty and volatility caused by the pandemic. EFAMA recently pushed for standardised EMIR derivatives reporting and a consolidated tape in Europe.

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Christian Somers had a long career with Candriam, contributing to major transformation initiatives and improvements to the firm’s order management, programme trading, electronic execution and transaction cost analysis for equities.

He has been replaced by Frédéric Heirebaudt who has become a senior equity trader in equities, derivatives and foreign exchange. Heirebaudt has been with Candriam Investors Group for almost 14 years working in portfolio management for private mandates.

Speaking to The TRADE, Candriam’s global head of trading, Fabien Oreve, explained that the firm has been busy adapting to MiFID II since the beginning of the year.

“New European regulations promote market transparency and more convergence between asset classes. We need diversity on our trading desk, with specialists and generalists, senior and junior traders working more horizontally,” he said.

“Having multi-disciplinary teams working together from completely different backgrounds and willing to adapt to new constraints is a business imperative for buy-side trading desks.”

Candriam has made efforts in recent years to bolster its multi-asset trading desk and foster new buy-side talent in Europe.

The firm hired TRADE Rising Star Vincent Minichetti from Edmond de Rothschild Asset Management in Paris in 2017 covering cash equity, FX and derivatives.

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The asset manager said his expertise in trading hybrid securities and derivatives will be a valuable addition to its trading team.

Batkin will be responsible for trading across fixed income, FX and dericatives. He has nine years of experience including five years in London as a market maker on EMEA convertible bonds for Mitsubishi UFJ Securities, and previously spent four years at Netixis CIB in Paris in a similar role.

Fabien Oreve, global head of trading at Candriam, said: “Not only will Cyril be an important resource within our Fixed Income unit, he will also help develop new trading capabilities within the whole team in Brussels on less-liquid debt, emerging market currencies and certain categories of derivative like options and credit-default swaps.”

He added that hiring someone with Batkin’s expertise would help the firm in developing its ability to navigate less liquid markets.

“There is a solution to trade in less liquid markets and that is to strengthen buy-side trading desks with skilled experts. People on the sell-side are available to join buy-side desks and we are happy to hire them,” Oreve told The Trade.

The post Candriam hires former market maker to navigate illiquid asset classes appeared first on The TRADE.

The firm’s business was flourishing after the country’s biggest firms had been listed and the market modernised.

As history shows, this is a big undertaking in a developed market, but this was a major shock in an emerging country.

It could have been the end for him, but instead, this trial by ordeal has coloured and influenced Oreve’s whole career and it gave him knowledge of financial markets from a back-office standpoint. It also allowed him to prove he was highly adaptable, dealing with a new environment in a different culture with new technologies.

From here, he moved to a French stockbroker handling securities lending in a collateral management position before taking an opportunity to go to the front office.

Here he helped create a program trading division, armed with no experience but his technical background and an ability to manage data.

Oreve has built a multi¬asset desk that is also experimenting with traders crossing into other areas – for instance equity into fixed income – but with certain safeguards.

Done to improve capacity, it has had the effect of improving working relationships as the traders interact more with each other, according to Oreve.

”Our productivity ratio has grown amazingly and I’m very proud of that, but it’s reached a point where we have to hire,” says Oreve.

He says more bodies are needed “to absorb the flow”, carry out transaction cost analysis and enhance relations with brokers. He sees this as key to Candriam’s development in the new post-Mifid II world.

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