Reuters Data Feed Direct OPRA is designed to process over one million updates per second using industry leading technology to leverage OPRA's FAST implementation, allowing clients to reduce bandwidth cost.

The North American options market is growing rapidly driven by an increase in algorithmic or machine based trading which demands high capacity, ultra fast data delivery. New strategies and increasing volumes are also encouraging faster and more efficient messaging systems, shown by OPRA's recent launch of the new FAST messaging framework.

Reuters Data Feed Direct offers high performance exchange feed connectivity and reduces customer workload by providing a fully managed global service. This includes daily reference data maintenance, all required hardware and software, and service monitoring by Reuters support teams. This latest release of Reuters Data Feed Direct OPRA offers sub millisecond speed and is scaled to meet future market data volume projections.

Reuters offers a broad portfolio of global exchanges and is committed to expanding venue availability throughout 2008 across all regions, whilst simultaneously adding new asset classes.

Bill Ruvo, Vice President and Business Manager, Reuters Data Feeds said: "The options market is expanding at a significant pace and Reuters has pioneered the development of its Reuters Data Feed Direct service to capitalise on enhancements undertaken by OPRA for the benefit of our clients. This latest initiative provides our clients with a cost effective and efficient solution that meets the varying data needs of participants across the options trading industry."