Bank of America Merrill Lynch has expanded its global algorithmic trading platform into Brazil, to meet increasing demand from international and local investors for trading products designed for Brazil’s Bovespa. The new offering includes several of Bank of America Merrill Lynch’s algorithms, including implementation shortfall and VWAP.
The bank said that it has adapted the algorithmic trading suite for use in more than 30 countries, and since combining earlier this year, the group has made more than 50 specific improvements to its core algorithmic offering, yielding improved performance for clients.
Bank of America Merrill Lynch added that its algorithmic trading platform provides a suite of fully anonymous, flexible algorithms with access to forms of liquidity, including 15 core equity and six core options algorithms. Clients can customise algorithms to conform to their goals and benchmark risk tolerance, and use them to express views on alpha horizon, momentum vs. mean reversion, and stock performance in absolute or relative terms.
Steve Schneider, head of Latin America equities at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, said: “Interest and liquidity in Brazilian stocks have risen significantly this year and as a result our international investor clients are asking for more sophisticated trading tools to access this market. We are also seeing increasing demand from our local high-touch trading clients, many of whom are now looking forward to using these new trading tools in Brazil.”
Lee Morakis, head of execution services sales at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, said: “We are well-versed in customizing our offering for new markets, and relied heavily on local trader feedback when fine-tuning our algos for the Bovespa. Our clients now have a robust new channel for accessing Brazil’s equity markets, complementing our full-service sales, trading and research operation in Sao Paolo.”
