Obituaries
Jaime Ruiz Sacristan, the president of the board of Bolsa Mexicana de Valores and an influential figure in Mexico's financial sector, passed away on April 12, aged 70, after he was hospitalized with coronavirus. Ruiz was the chief executive officer of Grupo Financiero Bital in 2003, when HSBC bought the company, and then served as general director of Grupo Financiero HSBC from 2004 until 2014. He was also the chairman and founder of Banco VE Por Mas and a board member of Byline Bancorp, and he served as the president of the Mexican Association of Banks from 2011 to 2013. Ruiz was appointed chairman of the exchange in 2015 and had been serving in that role ever since.
FIA regrets to report that futures industry veteran Darren Butler passed away in April at the age of 47. Butler had a long career in the City of London and will be remembered largely for his time working for LIFFE, both on the trading floor as a pit official and as a business development manager.
Butler was instrumental in developing the short-term interest rate options market when the business transferred from the trading floor to the telephone and screens. Combining a knowledge of this market with personal relationships within the market making and broking communities in London and the U.S. meant that he was a leading light when it came to all things related to STIR options. He also worked at Nasdaq and most recently at Société Générale.
Butler was an old-school City type, who loved nothing more than discussing the markets over a pint and gathering market intelligence from his many contacts in the market. His passion for the markets and its people meant many of Darren’s contacts became close friends and he will be sorely missed by all who knew him.
"I will remember Darren with a smile and laugh when I think of the good times we had on the LIFFE floor and on our business trips abroad," said Mark Phelps, group CEO of G. H. Financials.
Anthony Payne, head of relationship management and market access at LME, added, "Darren was great at his job, a natural networker. I will miss working with him, discussing the markets with him, but I look back fondly at the great times we had travelling and entertaining clients together, and the friendship we had."
A devoted family man, Darren leaves behind his wife Lisa and children Amber and Kyle.
People News
Charles Li, the CEO of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing, plans to step down from the role in October 2021, or earlier if a successor is found before then. Li, who has been CEO since 2010, spearheaded the company's acquisition of the London Metal Exchange in 2012 and initiated its Stock Connect program with mainland Chinese exchanges. Li told the board he does not intend to seek reappointment when his current contract ends in October next year, the company said in a regulatory filing. HKEX said a committee made up of Chairman Laura Cha and three other directors will conduct a formal search for a new CEO while Li continues to lead the organization to ensure a smooth transition.
U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission member Brian Quintenz said he will leave the post by the end of October. Since joining the CFTC in August 2017, Quintenz has pushed for revamping post-crisis regulations to make them less burdensome and led the CFTC's Technology Advisory Committee. He also took a hard line in a clash between the CFTC and European Union regulators on cross-border oversight of derivatives clearinghouses.
Goldman Sachs has promoted Alicia Crighton, a managing director based in New York, to co-head of global futures alongside Joseph Nehorai in London as well as head of prime services clearing and derivatives clearing services. Crighton and Nehorai report to Tom Barrett, a partner at the firm who oversees global futures execution and clearing, prime services clearing and derivatives clearing services. Crighton was previously chief operating officer of prime services U.S. clearing. Before that she was based in Hong Kong for five years overseeing the build-out of the firm's Asia clearing business. Crighton joined Goldman Sachs in 1998 as an analyst and was named a managing director in 2013. She is also a member of FIA’s board of directors and chair of its diversity and inclusion initiative.
Dan Gallagher, former commissioner at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, will become chief legal officer of Robinhood, the online brokerage that popularized commission-free trading of stocks and options. Gallagher, who has been a member of Robinhood’s board of directors since October, served as an SEC Commissioner from 2011 to 2015 and before that served as deputy director and co-acting director of the SEC's trading and markets division. He was most recently partner and deputy chair of the securities department at law firm WilmerHale. The company said he will replace Anne Hoge, who is leaving to attend to an illness in the family.
OCC, the world's largest equity derivatives clearing organization, announced the re-election of Craig Donohue as executive chairman of the board of directors. OCC also announced the election of four directors. These are: Tom Barrett, a partner at Goldman Sachs who oversees execution and clearing for futures and options as well as its derivatives clearing services and prime services clearing businesses, who joined the OCC board in 2020; Andrej Bolkovic, chief executive officer of the U.S. subsidiary of ABN AMRO Clearing, who joined the OCC board in 2017; Susan O'Flynn, managing director and global head of CCP strategy, governance and optimization at Morgan Stanley, who joined the board in 2019; and Richard Lindsey, managing partner, Windham Capital Management, who joined the board in 2008. The terms of all four directors expire in 2023.
Dan Marcus, co-head of the U.K. operations of interdealer broker Tradition, has resigned from the post and will leave the firm before the end of the year. His co-head Mike Anderson will become the sole head of Tradition London Group. Marcus joined Tradition in 2007 as general counsel from a similar role at the London Stock Exchange. In 2011 he assumed the role of CEO of Trad-X, the firm’s hybrid broking solution, and in 2013 he was appointed CEO of ParFX. He was also appointed global head of strategy and business development that year for Tradition Group, before being appointed to co-run the U.K. operations of the firm.
CLS, the foreign exchange settlement services provider, announced that Thomas Barkhuff has joined the company as chief information officer. He will report to CEO Marc Bayle de Jessé and will serve as a member of the executive management committee. Barkhuff joins CLS from CGI, where he was chief technology officer of the finance and insurance group. Before that he worked at TD Bank Group and Bank of America.
CLS also announced the hire of Keith Tippell as head of product. Tippell will be responsible for overseeing CLS’s existing product suite and all new product development in the settlement and processing business lines. He joins CLS from Droit Financial Technologies, where he was head of business development for Europe and Asia Pacific. He has also held product management and business development positions at firms including SWIFT and Markit.
Pico, a provider of data center infrastructure, exchange connectivity and cloud technology, has announced that Frank Troise will join as co-CEO alongside chairman and founder, Jarrod Yuster. Troise will partner with Yuster to accelerate the company's expansion. Troise most recently served as the president and CEO of agency brokerage Investment Technology Group. Prior to ITG, he was managing director and head of JPMorgan Execution Services, a global multi-asset electronic execution group within the investment bank. Before that he held senior manager positions in electronic trading at Barclays Capital and Lehman Brothers. Troise has been on the board of directors of Pico since September 2019 and will continue in that capacity.
Larry Tabb, the founder of the Tabb Group, an independent research firm based in New York, has joined Bloomberg as head of market structure research. Tabb ran the research firm for 17 years and specialized in research on capital markets, but in March he shut it down amid challenging business conditions. At Bloomberg, he will be part of the company's Bloomberg Intelligence service, which provides analysis and data on industries and companies.
Intercontinental Exchange, has appointed David Clifton as interim CEO of Bakkt, the digital assets trading and payments platform that is majority-owned by ICE. Clifton replaced Mike Blandina, who was appointed CEO in December 2019, and is leaving the company to pursue a new opportunity. Adam White, who was appointed president of Bakkt earlier this year, will continue in his role. Clifton, currently ICE’s vice president, M&A and integration, joined ICE in 2008, serving previously as associate general counsel, M&A.
Eventus Systems, a trade surveillance software provider, has appointed Perry Barth as chief financial officer, Dan Burton as vice president of engineering, Nolan Schiff as director of relationship management and Sharad Kumar as sales engineer. Barth and Burton will be based in the company's headquarters in Austin, TX, reporting to CEO Travis Schwab. Schiff and Kumar will operate out of Chicago, reporting respectively to Jeff Bell, Eventus president, and Scott Schroeder, global head of sales. Barth most recently served as vice president and CFO for Alchemy Systems. Burton was most recently managing director, development for proprietary trading firm DRW, while Schiff worked at INTL FCStone in Chicago as director of product/enterprise data. Kumar most recently was director of vendor relations at Telnyx.
Eventus has also announced that Roger Chandler joined the firm in London as Senior Sales Engineer, Europe. Chandler has extensive capital markets sales, service and management experience, most recently working as technology sales manager for Bloomberg LP. Before that, he spent nearly 11 years at technology vendor Fidessa. Chandler also will report to Scott Schroeder.
Diane Saucier has joined Pure Storage, a company that provides cloud-based data storage, as director of financial services solutions marketing. Saucier joins from Hitachi Vantara where she was the global solutions marketing manager, financial services. Prior to Hitachi Vantara, Saucier was a client relationship manager at Fitch Learning, head of U.S. business development at Celoxica, and vice president of global market development at Trading Technologies.
Cowen, a securities brokerage and investment banking firm, has named Martin Ferraro and Alan Circle as managing directors in its outsourced trading division and co-heads of foreign exchange, commodities and futures. Both are based in New York and report to Michael Rosen and Jack Seibald, global co-heads of prime brokerage and outsourced trading. Circle and Ferraro join Cowen from BTIG, where they were managing directors and co-heads of foreign exchange, commodities and futures.
