Best buy-side FX trading platform: Bloomberg

Bloomberg’s trading platform FXGO’s best-in-class FX trading solutions have cemented it as an indispensable platform, with impressive system integration and extensive liquidity gaining particular praise

Providing seamless access to deep liquidity and powerful functionality for price-takers to negotiate FX transactions with their bank relationships, Bloomberg’s FXGO multibank FX trading platform has secured the Best buy-side FX trading platform award in the FX Markets Asia FX Awards 2023. With streaming or request for quote (RFQ) available for spot, outrights, non-deliverable forwards (NDFs), swaps, deposits and options in any currency pair and tenor, FXGO offers decision-makers a critical edge by connecting them to a dynamic network of information, people and liquidity. 

Used by leading asset managers, pension funds, corporate treasuries, government agencies and regional and global banks, FXGO is a crucial tool for controlling currency exposure and risk, and identifying market opportunities. The platform’s buy-side FX trading solutions are best-in-class, as highlighted by the depth and breadth of its liquidity pool, its integration with nearly 100 order management systems, compared with industry average of 20–80, and its innovative solutions for complex workflows. 

In terms of coverage, FXGO provides extensive liquidity across all instruments and tenors from more than 800 global and regional banks, comprising more than 6,000 dealing desks. With active traders in more than 140 countries, the platform offers unparalleled depth in onshore and emerging markets liquidity. FXGO also integrates with almost every order management, treasury management and accounting system, and facilitates straight-through processing in a variety of flexible formats so workflow is seamless, more efficient and error-free. Additionally beneficial for platform users is that system integration saves firms time and money so clients do not have to connect platforms individually to each bank or counterparty, because Bloomberg FXGO links them together flawlessly.

Unlike other trading platforms, Bloomberg’s FXGO is set apart by its commitment to providing the service at no additional cost to its clients’ existing subscriptions. 

To ensure clients’ needs are met in the first instance, Bloomberg provides a global and dedicated integration team that facilitates seamless project management and customer service around the clock. Algorithmic trading continues to grow as part of a broad range of Bloomberg’s clients’ execution toolkits. To support these efforts, Bloomberg bolstered its algo trading strategies to further power its clients’ businesses.

In this context, the company’s algo trading solution is the only offering on the market that has pre-trade analytics capabilities. This solution allows liquidity providers to host pre-trade, running and post-trade order analytics in tandem with FXGO to select the appropriate strategy and liquidity pool at the initiation of their order route and subsequent execution. 

To mitigate the challenge that geographic latency presents to a global market of liquidity providers and consumers – particularly for Asia‑Pacific (Apac) clients – Bloomberg introduced a liquidity hub in Singapore. This allows Apac liquidity providers to connect with local liquidity consumers through servers based in SG1, greatly improving the speed and success of trading. To the same end, FXGO has now embedded RFQ capabilities directly into its FX trading grid, increasing efficiency in execution and ease of trading. 

The platform additionally introduced a local order slicer, which allows clients to slice large orders over a period of time and execute them against streaming liquidity. To improve overall trading efficiency, Bloomberg also expanded its automated offerings from FX spot to FX outrights and NDFs via an application programming interface trading solution and Rule Builder FX. 

Looking to effect further ongoing improvements in its FXGO platform offering, Bloomberg continues to partner with its buy-side clients to enhance its FX trading workflow. Over the past 12 months, Bloomberg FXGO increased its number of algo providers from 30 to 36, and boosted the number of providers offering NDF algos from five to nine. Additionally, Bloomberg extended the reporting capabilities of the platform to provide buy-side clients much greater clarity on maker pricing quality and the cause of rejects. 

The previous year also saw Bloomberg launch regulated electronic trading platforms in India and Indonesia, providing continuous service and liquidity in newly regulated markets. All of these efforts yielded a rise in FXGO’s Apac FX of 19% year-on-year, while batch (portfolio) trading volume increased by 30% over the same period. 

For the coming year, Bloomberg intends to continue expanding its rule-based solutions and direct order routing capabilities as clients look for ways to manage low-touch trades. The company is also looking to develop its analytics capabilities based on quantifiable metrics – beyond transaction cost analysis – as these continue to gain in importance for clients’ pre-trade decision-making. 

As underlined by Tod Van Name, global head of FX electronic trading at Bloomberg: “FX markets are dynamic and require continuous innovation, so finding the right technology partner is critical.

“Bloomberg remains committed to providing robust, efficient and forward-thinking solutions for buy-side firms via an extensive range of liquidity, execution methods and sophisticated workflows.” 
 

Bloomberg’s FXGO was named Best buy-side FX trading platform at the FX Markets Asia FX Awards 2023.

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