< The 2016 Trading Technology 40

12
Gerald O’Connell
Chief Information Officer
CBOE Holdings
Last year: 12

After more than 30 years in technology positions at CBOE Holdings, 23 of them as chief information officer, Gerald O’Connell asserts that the multiexchange operator is more competitive than ever. And the 64-year-old isn’t done innovating. Following its 2014 success in expanding trading hours on its popular Volatility Index to nearly 24 hours a day, five days a week, the Chicago-based company extended hours for more options products in 2015. Additional trading capability and lower latency are on the agenda for 2016, but even more significant, O’Connell says, is a new matching engine. Known as Vector, the system is being developed from scratch and will be launched on the CBOE Futures Exchange in the second half of the year. “CBOE’s Vector is being designed for maximum flexibility and scalability, and, we believe, will be an industry leader in terms of latency,” boasts O’Connell. “We think we’ll be leapfrogging most of the industry with this new technology.” He estimates latency will improve by a factor of five to ten over the current system, Command. In addition to speeding up order tracking and trades, Vector is expected to introduce new risk controls, some at the request of customers and some mandated by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, according to O’Connell. In September, CBOE teamed up with Environmental Financial Products, the market development firm led by futures pioneer Richard Sandor, to launch the American Financial Exchange, designed to bring standardization and transparency to short-term lending among small and midsize banks. AFX will use the new Vector technology.

 
2016 Trading Technology 40

1. Raymond Tierney III Bloomberg 2. Richard Prager BlackRock Methanol Gains Traction as an Alternative Energy Source Sponsored by CME Group May 5, 2025 3. Chris Isaacson BATS Global Markets 4. Jonathan Ross KCG Holdings 5. Bradley Peterson Nasdaq

6. Brad Levy Markit 7. Dan Keegan Citi 8. Ronald DePoalo Fidelity Institutional 9. Raj Mahajan Goldman Sachs Group 10. Ari Studnitzer CME Group

11. Mayur Kapani Intercontinental Exchange 12. Gerald O’Connell CBOE Holdings 13. Nicholas Themelis MarketAxess Holdings 14. Gil Mandelzis EBS BrokerTec (ICAP) 15. Bill Chow and Richard Leung Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing

16. Rob Park IEX Group 17. Philip Weisberg Thomson Reuters 18. John Mackay (Mack) Gill MillenniumIT 19. Robert Cornish International Securities Exchange 20. Paul Hamill Citadel Securities

21. Eric Noll Convergex 22. Tyler Moeller and Joshua Walsky Broadway Technology 23. Rishi Nangalia REDI Holdings 24. Veronica Augustsson Cinnober Financial Technology 25. Alasdair Haynes Aquis Exchange

26. Manoj Narang Mana Partners 27. Gaurav Suri Arcesium 28. Robert Sloan S3 Partners 29. Anton Katz and Stephen Mock AQR Capital Mgmt 30. Stu Taylor Algomi

31. D. Keith Ross Jr. PDQ Enterprises 32. Donal Byrne Corvil 33. Alfred Eskandar Portware 34. R. Cromwell Coulson OTC Markets Group 35. Masayuki Hosaka Rakuten

36. Peter Maragos and David Karat Dash Financial 37. Amar Kuchinad Electronifie 38. Jennifer Nayar SR Labs 39. Dave Snowdon Metamako 40. Dan Raju Tradier