The tie up will combine TradingScreen’s TCA capabilities in FX with Zeno’s consulting services in the fund management industry, the companies said in a statement. “This relationship gives plan sponsors insight into their foreign exchange transaction costs at a time when they are demanding greater transparency into investment practices for FX execution quality,” says Jon Fatica, global head of analytics for TradingScreen.
“Their review process should result in additional business being directed to dealers who are shown to produce best executions.”
TradingScreen last month launched a real-time TCA tool for multiple-asset classes, including FX, which provides graphical monitoring of executions for large orders.
The product includes a heatmap representation of TCA-related data, which the company says will help control costs across markets with fragmented liquidity as well as providing a warning system for adverse market moves.
“When TradingScreen launched real-time, multi-asset-class transaction cost analysis for the buy-side, we immediately saw the potential of adapting this technology to the asset owner community,” says Steve Glass, president and CEO at Zeno.
“By combining TradingScreen’s tools with our own analytics, data, insights and relationships, we were able to create a powerful offering that can make a real difference to asset owners.
This year, a slew of firms have introduced TCA tools to meet that demand, threatening to put pressure on the margins at leading custodian banks.
Global asset consultancy Mercer has launched a service to allow institutional investors to monitor the costs involved in FX transactions, while ITG, the agency broker, and New York-based Abel Noser Solutions both released TCA tools in April. FXall, the leading multi-dealer FX platform, launched its execution quality analysis tool in the third quarter of last year.
Other firms, such as FX Transparency LLC, Global Trading Analytics and Russell Investments, have established themselves as leading providers of such services in recent years.