[ I N D U S T R Y
P R O F I L E
|
M A R K
H E M S L E Y ]
Mark Hemsley has a new role following CBOE’s $3.4 billion acquisition
of Bats. The TRADE’s online editor, John Bakie, caught up with the
new president for Europe at CBOE Holdings about the takeover and
plans for the future.
W
hen I first met Mark Hems-
ley four years ago he was
CEO of Bats Chi-X Europe,
an equities multilateral
trading facility (MTF) that
had become the single larg-
est trading venue by volume
in Europe. However, in the relatively short time since,
that MTF has become a regulated exchange, branched
out into exchange traded funds (ETFs), foreign
exchange (FX) and launched a post-trade reporting
service.
The rise of its European business mirrored the rapid
success of its US parent Bats Global Markets, founded
as an alternative trading system in 2005. It too has
seen huge growth that has enabled it to rival much
older exchange operators such as NYSE and Nasdaq.
In March this year, Bats once again began a new
chapter in its development after it was acquired by
Chicago-based derivatives exchange CBOE for $3.4
billion. The TRADE met up with Hemsley to get
“The merger enables us to offer a wider products
set but it also gives CBOE a much bigger footprint
outside of North America.”
an idea of how the new, enlarged group is going to
look and what its key priorities will be as MiFID II
approaches.
Hemsley, now president, Europe at CBOE Holdings,
says that integration of the two businesses is already
underway.
“It is early days but the main thing we’ve already
done is have the CBOE derivatives team in Europe join
us in our London office. This means we can introduce
them better to out significant customer base in both
equities and FX,” he explains.
By bringing the CBOE team in to work alongside
their Bats colleagues at such an early stage, the firm
36
TheTrade
Summer 2017
is hopeful it will create a two-way
dialogue that benefits both sides of
the business.
“The CBOE side has been edu-
cating the team about the compa-
ny’s derivatives offer, not just the
leading VIX and S&P products
buy a range of other derivatives
that CBOE offers. Meanwhile we
are helping them to get to grips
with the complex market struc-
ture issues in Europe, particularly
MiFID II.”
“We’re organising ourselves with
product managers who understand
their particular areas. We have
the trade desk team which is all
local here in London, while FX is
very much a global product and
derivatives are being handled out
of Chicago and Kansas.”
But merely expanding the client
databases of the two firms is not in
and of itself a reason for two of the
biggest names in their respective
fields to merge, Hemsley says there
is a lot more than this behind the
logic of the acquisition.
“The merger enables us to offer a
wider products set but it also gives
CBOE a much bigger footprint
outside of North America, access to
the world of FX and equities and of
course the Bats technology which
CBOE is adopting.”
He is also hopeful the combined
group will able to pool its resourc-
es to make a big push into Asia,
where both firms currently have a
relatively small presence, though
Hemsley stresses it is growing. The