After joining the company as CEO in January 2024, Jeff Ward and FXSpotStream embarked on a record setting year. Now, in Q2 of year two, we caught up with him again to see if he felt the growth was sustainable, or a benchmark on which to build.
Jeff, thank you for taking the time to speak with us. 2024 was a historic year for the company; could you have asked for a better way to start your new role?
I had said before the interview process that it was the FSS role or nothing for me. I had seen the company from the outside and admired how they did business and what they stood for. Once I started in January, I quickly realized that I had been right in my assumptions. There was a very high standard set for the workload, and it was great to join a team that was highly motivated to succeed.
In January we set a new overall ADV record, and things did not slow down after that – we went on to set six new overall ADV records in 2024. What was more impressive though was how these records were being set. While Spot has always been the strength of the Service, we were taking significant steps in all products, most notably in FX Swaps and NDFs.
Were there any surprises when you came into the role?
I don’t know if I’d call it a surprise, but I was very impressed with the level of support offered to clients and LPs by the FSS team. It was something I had been aware of in the past, but across the board, there is a level of proactivity that is extremely reassuring for those connected to FSS. We are always looking to get ahead of a potential issue and find answers as quickly as possible. It’s a level of care that is often lost as a company grows, but here, there is a high level of pride taken by everyone to ensure that the level of service does not drop.
And how has 2025 started for FXSpotStream?
From a volume perspective, 2025 has started with a bang; February, March and April providing consecutive record months from an ADV standpoint. From an overall standpoint, our ADV is up 38.97%, while our Spot ADV is up 39.66% YTD (January-April 2025 vs 2024).
While we have certainly enjoyed the fast-paced start to the year, what is most important to our clients is that the service has operated extremely well, especially in terms of performance during periods of high volatility. Our reject rate has remained consistently low, which I would put down to our fully upgraded network and trading infrastructure, but also the work done by our Support Team to be proactive and get ahead of potential issues.
With such a strong start to your tenure, where do you go from here?
While it has been a tremendous start to the year for the Service, it would not have been possible without the work that our CTO, Tom San Pietro and his team put in migrating the entire Service to a new Ultra Low Latency Network (ULL).
Volumes have continued to grow rapidly over the Service and our job is to ensure that our clients can always access the market confidently, especially when there are large global events that are driving market activity.
As with any technology, over time it can become outdated. Two years ago, we began the huge task of migrating all clients and LPs to a new network that aimed to deliver market data with a maximum latency time of no more than 250 microseconds. While many will reference average latency times, and we agree there is value in doing so, our goal was to ensure that at maximum volatility, the market could rely on the Service to perform at a high level, regardless.
What clients now connecting to FSS can expect is a network built for high volumes, with extremely low latency that is highly competitive from a performance standpoint. Our volumes and client base are a testament to the level of satisfaction our end users experience on the Service.
I believe complacency is something that has no place in the FX market. While 2024 was extremely exciting from a number’s perspective, we realize that people are starting to take note of FSS and we must continue to do a great job every day.
We cannot afford to stand still and admire our hard work, because someone will overtake us. Towards the end of 2024, we began work to identify products and client segments in which we felt we could grow, and the additions from a product standpoint that we would need to make to increase our appeal to them.
Can you share your findings?
In terms of client types, the Systematic Hedge Funds have really proven to be a sweet spot for FSS in recent years. Our offering can be rolled out company wide, while individual managers can customize their own liquidity pool with ease. New pods can go live with very little work to be done, and the testing process remains consistent.
Given our strong presence in the Systematic Hedge Fund world, we have decided to work with our technology partner to provide a new GUI offering, available and tailored to Macro Hedge Funds trading needs.
The new GUI will leverage many of the recurring needs we heard expressed by those members of the Macro HF community with which we spoke, with the unique scalability of the FXSpotStream model. While we feel there will be additions to be made down the line, we are confident that we are coming to market on day one with an established and extremely competitive product and a compelling pitch.
For those not familiar, what is the FXSpotStream model?
FXSpotStream was originally founded to alleviate growing costs associated with the electronification of the FX market. As a result, our model has always aimed to be cost effective for both the buyside and sell side alike. For our Liquidity Providers, we offer a flat fee model which means that regardless of their monthly volumes, they know the bottom line and in effect, the more business they put through FSS, the lower their effective commission rate would be.
In 2023 we introduced a number of new plans which were a mixture of the subscription fee model and a commission-based pricing model, to allow for new LPs to join the Service and increase their volumes over time. Since implementing these, we have seen 4 new LPs go live – ANZ, Deutsche Bank, Natwest and Wells Fargo – and continue to have conversations with new LPs.
We feel that rate cards that suit our LPs will ultimately be reflected in better pricing for our clients as the LPs will want to do that business over FSS rather than a channel where they are being charged a higher per million fee.
From a client perspective, we have normalized the offerings of all 18 of our liquidity providers and made them available via a single API or GUI. Clients pay nothing to access pricing from as many of the LPs as they have a relationship with, and FSS supports pricing in Spot, Swaps, Forwards, NDF, NDS and Precious Metals out of co-location sites in New York, London and Tokyo.
In addition, we have undergone the same process with the algos of the participating liquidity providers and clients can access these in the same way, with no charge from FXSpotStream.
Furthermore, FXSpotStream is vendor agnostic, meaning that if you use a technology provider for any of your connectivity, network or trading needs, FSS can often do the work to integrate with them, minimizing the disruption to your operations.
Are there any other advances in the pipeline?
After recent announcements in the FX industry, we feel that there is a growing opportunity for a alternative in FX Swaps and that our unique offering makes us a strong candidate to fill this need. As mentioned, we are looking at Macro Hedge Funds to grow FX Swaps activity on the service. Given Hedge Funds large market interest and sophisticated needs in the FX Swaps market, we are also targeting the end of Q2 as a go live date for supporting Streaming FX Swaps.
This is an area that we have paid close attention to and been monitoring interest from the market for a while now. Working closely with early adopter LPs to introduce this to our offering before opening this up more broadly.
It certainly seems like there is a lot more to come for FXSpotStream.
Absolutely. We are always looking for ways to improve the Service, but what has to remain consistent is the level of pride and attention to detail that the staff show daily.
At FXSpotStream we have a team that are hungry to succeed and provide the highest level of service possible. It is about getting the most out of these relationships for both our clients and LPs and we are extremely motivated to do just that.
