There is a packed agenda for Galen Stops’ last In the FICC of It podcast as he and Colin Lambert discuss a busy week in FX markets – especially if you’re in the survey business! 

After Lambert salutes Refinitiv for its gesture in donating brokerage to the Australian bushfire relief effort and Martin Mead on his retirement (the podcast was recorded during the celebration, but sadly from 13,000 miles away) from the FX market, it’s back to cynical business as they take a look at the fourth annual e-trading survey from JP Morgan. While Stops questions some of the findings,  he is keen to highlight the emergence of data as a key factor in trading, while Lambert thinks it is more significant what isn’t in the report, and remains convinced that in spite of a lower number naming it as their number one concern, liquidity is still front and centre of dealers’ minds night and day. It also, much to everyone’s disappointment, gives him a chance to roll out his ultimate definition of liquidity…again.

The discussion then moves onto events surrounding last week’s sterling spike ahead of the Bank of England monetary policy announcement and while Stops has a (tongue in cheek) explanation for it, Lambert is less convinced, believing that someone “might have been a little naughty”. He also asserts his view that the regulators need to clamp down on such behaviour and is so “positive” in his view that Stops nominates him for FCA head!

Lambert is in even more strident form as our podcasters discuss the FCA’s HFT report last week, not least in his assertion that the equity market structure is “stuffed up” and that this type of trading, “adds nothing to the market” and is just “blokes with microwave towers pinging away at each other”.

There is time for a quick look at events around the FX Global Code, following the BIS Markets Committee’s open letter to the Global FX Committee and the latter’s release of a report into anonymous trading on platforms, with Stops still struggling to see buy side adoption accelerating and Lambert sensing a lack of consensus on the GFXC around the key issues of anonymous trading, last look and the use of tags.

The podcast closes out with Lambert turning the tables on Stops with a surprise quiz. As the latter heads to a new role at 360T, Lambert probes him with questions about his new employer – so tune in to find out exactly how much he knows about his new firm!