Growth in electronic trading of foreign exchange (FX) has stabilized among the largest institutionsthose generating more than $50 billion in annual trading volume. Meanwhile, it seems that any recent growth in electronic foreign exchange (e-FX) trading is being driven by highly active retail aggregators and hedge funds and smaller, less active players.Geographically, the worlds largest and arguably most mature FX marketContinental Europenotched a meaningful decline in the share of foreign exchange volume executed electronically last year. Canada, a small market and a traditional e-FX laggard, saw substantial increases in the percent of market participants trading FX on electronic systems and in the share of total FX volume executed electronically. Among the platforms capturing this e-FX volumne, a well-established trend reversed in 2013:Market participants reduced the share of their electronic trading business executed on multi-dealer platforms and increased the amount of business done through single-dealer systems. MethodologyBetween September and November 2013, Greenwich Associates conducted in-person and telephone interviews with 1,584 financial professionals using foreign exchange at large, top-tier corporations and financial institutions in North America, Latin America, Europe, Asia, Australia, and Japan. To be considered top tier, a firm must meet one of the following criteria: be a fund manager, hedge fund, central bank, retail aggregator, Fortune Global 500 firm, or treasury center; or have reported trading volume of more than $10 billion; or have sales of more than $5 billion.
