Advantage Futures selects ION’s XTP for real-time, post-trade capabilities

NEW YORK – 10 September 2024: ION, a global leader in trading, analytics, treasury, and risk management solutions for capital markets, commodities, and treasury management, announces that Advantage Futures has successfully migrated to ION’s cleared derivatives trade processing platform, XTP.

Advantage Futures ranks among the industry’s highest volume futures commission merchants, processing over 5.3 billion contracts since the firm’s launch in 2003. Known for reliable connectivity to exchanges worldwide, execution services, and a commitment to advanced technology, Advantage Futures serves a diverse client base, including professional traders, institutional clients, exchange-traded funds, foreign and domestic non-clearing futures brokers, hedge funds, and individual traders.

After using the same post-trade technology platform for decades, Advantage Futures sought a flexible, modern solution that could provide extensive automation across clearing and settlement workflows. XTP will allow the firm to scale its business even further and create a more efficient, unified experience for clients with real-time visibility of positions, commissions, fees, margins, cash flows, and risk.

ION’s continued investment in XTP’s capabilities has helped it onboard a rapidly growing number of futures commission merchants and global banks.

Joe Guinan, Chairman and CEO of Advantage Futures, said: “In the two decades since founding Advantage Futures, we’ve expanded from a small boutique to among the industry’s highest volume clearing firms serving some of the world’s high-volume traders. As we continue to scale the business, we prioritize giving clients best-in-class, customized technology to seamlessly navigate an increasingly complex market. Having successfully completed the migration to ION’s XTP, we now deliver real-time data and automation capabilities, meeting client needs to process ever-growing trade volumes quickly and efficiently.”

Francesco Margini, Chief Product Officer for Cleared Derivatives, ION Markets, said: “We are very pleased about our partnership with Advantage Futures, one of the industry’s highest volume clearing firms. The transition from their legacy back-office solution to XTP was completed in record time, leveraging ION’s established methodology and tools developed to manage large and complex migration projects. The Advantage-XTP rollout demonstrates ION’s proven track record in bringing new products to the market and the strong discipline required for a timely and successful delivery to customers.”

About Advantage Futures

Advantage Futures is among the highest volume clearing firms in the futures industry with a diverse client base. The Chicago-based firm processed over 325 million contracts in 2023. Advantage clients are domiciled in 64 countries, territories, and jurisdictions and can access over 20 futures exchanges around the world. Advantage operates an agency model brokerage and does not trade for its own account; thereby avoiding a conflict of interest by not competing with client trading. Advantage hosts servers and other technology equipment and provides technology-related services for clients. For more information, visit https://www.advantagefutures.com.