We have many reasons to celebrate 2025 as an industry. Both the FIA and its principal US regulator, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, mark their 70th and 50th anniversaries, respectively. FIA’s Asia office and the FIA Hall of Fame celebrate twenty years. Even our beloved Boca Conference observes its golden anniversary in 2025.
We absolutely should take time to reflect on these milestones. We should remember and express gratitude to the innovators and founders of our industry that built these markets through bold ideas and hard work. We stand on the shoulders of these giants.
If you want to know their names, start with the FIA Hall of Fame, including this year’s special anniversary class. Reading their biographies will have you in awe of their accomplishments. They come from various backgrounds, disciplines and regions. And they all share one common characteristic: an innovative spirit.
They did not let the past dictate their story or pathway. Many of them were pioneers that bucked the system. Take Margery “Large Marge” Teller, who helped break the glass ceiling in the trading pits by being the best at her craft: trading Eurodollars. Or the legendary founders of our modern industry – like Leo Melamed, Jack Sandner, Richard Sandor, Sir Brian Williamson and Ng Kok Song – who thought outside the box and ignored the naysayers. None of these individuals ever said, “It’s always been done this way.”
Their passion and drive remind me of one of my favourite movies, Dead Poet’s Society, starring Robin Williams as the inspirational teacher at an all-boys private school in the US. In one of the movie’s penultimate scenes, Williams makes the boys read a poem in front of the school’s trophy case that contains pictures of the school’s “Hall of Fame” alumni.
The poem’s opening stanza begins, “Gather ye rosebuds while ye may…,” which Williams notes in Latin is short for carpe diem or seize the day. Williams powerfully makes the point that life is short, and one must act boldly to make one’s life extraordinary, because someday we will all “fertilise daffodils.”
Stark and powerful, this lesson is one that all Hall of Fame members would tell a young person entering our industry today. Trust your gut. Be bold. Follow your instincts. Don’t let the past dictate your path.
Do you think Leo Melamed heard from naysayers that you can’t trade futures on a computer? Or Richard Sandor that interest rate futures would fail? Or Kok Song that you can’t do cross-border trading electronically? Of course they did. These individuals ignored the naysayers and seized the day. And we are better for it.
The future is bright
There are certain principles of our markets that are as valid today as when these giants blazed their trails. We should learn from them and allow them to inspire – not dictate – our future.
We support fair competition because competition sharpens the offerings of all participants, benefiting the entirety of the system. We support responsible innovation because innovation lowers costs and improves the customer experience. We support smart regulation because fair rules provide needed certainty for capital investments and make the system safer.
Developing technologies will dramatically impact our markets, from tokenisation to AI to quantum computing. Already, they have caused some doubting whispers among the naysayers who do not want to change. We must not listen!
Yes, these technologies will disrupt our industry. Yes, we will need to adapt. Yes, we have been here before.
Whether electronic trading or financial futures or principles-based regulations, we have faced disruption before. We adapted, we moved forward, and the markets are stronger for it. Remember … gather ye rosebuds!
But unlike earlier industry developments, the pace of these modern technological breakthroughs will be exponential. I am reminded that iPhones have only existed since 2007. Can we imagine living without smartphones today?
AI and quantum computing likely will revolutionise our lives and our markets sooner rather than later. How will our industry deal with it? The answer is, straight on.
FIA stands ready. We will help market participants understand and embrace these developments as they occur. We will highlight these new technologies in our conference programming, webinars and white papers.
Where needed, we will gather industry experts to explore ways to approach problems, like we did with the founding of the Industry Resilience Committee after a major cyber breach or the founding of the Derivatives Market Institute for Standards (DMIST) to help standardise the trade flow and systems that support our industry’s functioning and resilience.
That said, when these new ideas and technologies enter the industry, we should demand they meet the time-tested principles of our markets: same activity, same risk, same rules. Remember, our industry strives for fair competition, which means that all market participants that do the same activity should abide by the same rules. Fairness demands a level playing field for all.
We must always nurture a mindset and culture of innovation and resilience. We must always consider new approaches. We must always look to the next generation to lead the way.
As we reflect on these anniversaries, we recognise and celebrate the amazing leaders that precede us, and we use their example to remind ourselves to “seize the day” in facing the future.
