This article first appeared on Floating Path.
Amsterdam-based Optiver, one of the world’s largest high frequency trading firms, recently opened an office in Shanghai and the firm is enthusiastic about the county’s potential.
Despite a lack HFT participation in most of Asia, the company’s head of market structure, Jelle Elzinga, believes growth in Chinese-based HFT is a real possibility in the short term future.
“This market is too important to trade from Australia. The technology of the exchanges has improved a lot. It is getting a far more level playing field. The amount of new China-related products like China 50 Index Futures are proving more popular in Singapore, and the Chinese market is expected to open up in the next 2-5 years.”
The move fits into the context of recent revelations in the HFT world. Amid regulatory crackdowns in Europe, HFT profits have been cut in half. Optiver just reported a 24% decline in net trading income for the year. Conversely in Asia, the landscape is also beginning to shift as some markets like Singapore look to embrace high frequency trading in hopes of boosting trade volumes.
