Transaction Network Services (TNS) today announced that it has been appointed by Westpac, to provide trading counterparty connectivity services to its institutional banking division.
Using TNS' secure network, the Secure Trading Extranet, Australia's foremost banking organisation will have direct access via a single TNS connection to a global financial community of more than 1,000 connected end points.
Westpac is Australia's oldest bank and provides comprehensive retail, commercial, wealth management, corporate and institutional banking services to a diverse customer base globally. Listed on the Australian Stock Exchange, it employs over 25,000 people in offices around the world.
The investment banking division will be able to connect to customers worldwide directly to provide executable streaming prices in a range of financial markets instruments. Initially, these will focus on foreign exchange.
Jim Nuzum, Global Head of eFX Distribution and Services, Westpac said: "Making it easy for our customers to access Westpac liquidity eliminates potentially significant implementation barriers. We can be more responsive and focus on adding real value, rather than on the intricacies of connectivity and messaging protocols.
"Certainty of order flow and execution is a crucial part of our customer engagement approach, particularly in an environment increasingly defined by milliseconds. TNS' network has a strong reputation for speed and security of transmission of trades. Anything we can do to improve this translates into superior customer experience."
Deploying TNS' Secure Trading Extranet, Westpac will be able to take advantage of wider services such as access to trading applications, trader voice services, order routing, market data and exchanges. Already, the investment banking division has upgraded its network to install a disaster recovery facility in London.
John Owens, Business Development Director, TNS said: "There is a general move to electronic trading, which is being enabled by development and take up of open standards such as FIX and internet protocol.
"TNS is supportive of initiatives, which help to achieve the benefits of straight-through-processing. Westpac will now have access to a managed network, which is cost-effective and means the bank can connect to any other on-net institution within a few days.
"We are delighted Westpac has chosen TNS' Secure Trading Extranet and look forward to working with them to help develop their business."