FX Solutions, an IT-driven online foreign exchange brokerage auto-executing almost 99 percent of customer trades, today announced the hiring of Daniel Darst as Executive Director of Institutional and Partner Business.
Darst joins FX Solutions from Saxo Bank, where he oversaw the rapid growth and development of the bank's white label business as Executive Director and Global Head of Partnerships.
In his new role, Darst will expand the company's "white label" offering, identifying and recruiting licensed financial services firms which share FX Solutions' commitment to efficient trading, e-commerce and customer service. He will also be responsible for increasing the number of introducing brokers, commodity trading advisors and commodity pool operators utilizing the platform.
"FX Solutions' success is based on leveraging technology to improve transparency and enable automation," said Robert Cortright, managing partner of FX Solutions. "Daniel brings a very strategic, focused approach that will ensure that we partner with firms that share this commitment to technology."
To differentiate its white label business, in which organizations offer FX Solutions' platform under their own brand identities, Darst will soon introduce new value-added services to aid those firms in marketing, sales, staffing and customer support.
"FX Solutions made its name through innovation, customer service and a truly world-class trading platform," said Darst. "I expect to do the same with the white label business and look forward to driving our partners' growth in the forex trading marketplace."
Retail forex trading volume is estimated at $50 billion per day, according to a February 2007 report from UK-based research firm ClientKnowledge. As a result, banks are increasingly evaluating how to best offer forex trading capabilities to their retail customers. Many of these firms find white labeling to be a successful way to speed up the process.
"The opportunity in retail FX is real for banks, but they cannot easily catch up with retail platforms by building internally," said David Poole, COO and Principal of ClientKnowledge, in the report. "Banks have growing confidence that white labeliing is feasible as an accelerator into the retail market, bringing additional revenue and making them attractive to a larger client base."
On April 12, 2007, FX Solutions received an investment in excess of $100 million from Francisco Partners.