Their interview is published in the Trade Asia Issue 1. Below is a part of the article:
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Market differences notwithstanding, the penetration of electronic trading across the region is changing the comparative value proposition of global, regional and local sellside actors. For local brokers, order management technologies began to have a significant impact in 2002, when the idea of STP started to take hold. "The preference for electronic order communication among the sell-side is certainly getting higher," says Nick Ng, CEO, eBroker Systems, a Hong Kong-based broker and trading technology provider with offices in Hong Kong and Shenzhen. "For local brokers, I would say well over 50% are fully electronic in their overall operation." This, however, is partly driven by external requirements. "The main driver we find is often the need for US executions," says Ng. Cost savings from electronic trading in the Asia-Pacific region are limited, he suggests. "Korea, for example, is electronic, but if you want to connect to the KSE, you have to go through Coscom, which is an IT subsidiary of the exchange." It is not uncommon, however, for brokers, whether local or foreign, to offer a package of services including both sales trading and electronic capabilities as far as they can be extended. "We actually have two prongs to our business," says Ng. "On the one hand we have our own securities house dealing for institutional clients in the Asia-Pacific region and US, but the business as a whole is technology-driven and our OMS is multi-broker."