FXCM targets wholesale and prime of prime

Foreign exchange broker FXCM is refocusing the direction of its institutional business on wholesale and prime-of-prime (PoP) services, and away from non-core assets, which it will look to sell.

FXCM Pro, the wholesale business for retail brokers, small hedge funds and emerging market banks, and FXCM Prime, the PoP service catering for high-frequency trading (HFT) firms, have been identified by the firm as growth areas.

FXCM says it recently doubled the size of its broker services desk – a support team handling all retail enquiries – while FXCM Prime has its first customers trading live, transacting about $2 billion per day in total.

"With the pending disposition of institutional non-core assets, we are now purely focused on mobilising more resources to our wholesale business where we have seen tremendous success," says Brandon Mulvihill, global head of institutional sales at FXCM. "In 2014 this business line produced approximately $1 trillion in trading volumes and proved post-January 15 to be among the most resilient institutional clientele at FXCM."

The move to realign the institutional business comes shortly after FXCM announced it would be selling non-core assets to help pay the $300 million loan from Leucadia National Corporation, which it took out following losses of $225 million after the Swiss franc crisis on January 15.

In 2014 this business line produced approximately $1 trillion in trading volumes and proved post-January 15 to be among the most resilient institutional clientele at FXCM

The retail broker has already sold FXCM Japan for $62 million. Meanwhile, US bank Jefferies Bache, owned by Leucadia, recently merged with Faros Trading, in which FXCM had a 50.1% stake. Other assets to be sold include FastMatch, the institutional FX platform that has already begun adopting clients from FXCM Pro, and HFT businesses Lucid Markets and V3 Markets.