Mike Sobel is president of Trumid.
1. Assess the state of your corporate bond trading platform – what were the primary milestones/accomplishments over the past year?
Trumid is an all-to-all electronic credit trading platform for institutional clients. We currently trade high yield, distressed and investment grade securities, and plan to expand to CDS later in 2016. Our goal is to make bond trading easier by supporting a network of all credit participants and providing a set of tools to access that network. We believe trading is harder than it should be, and that technology can play an important role in unlocking liquidity. Since launching 11 months ago with 63 institutions, Trumid now has nearly 250 onboarded institutions and trade volumes of over $3.5 billion. An all-to-all trading platform is a network effect business, in that participation by each incremental user makes the platform more valuable for all other users. As our network continues to grow and strengthen, we will continue to provide technology solutions to help tap into the liquidity within the network.
Mike Sobel, Trumid
2. What are your key current initiatives?
Over nearly a year of operation, we have learned a tremendous amount through analysis and deep engagement with our clients. We have incorporated all that we’ve learned into a new and fully proprietary platform that will meet and anticipate client needs. Our newest offering will have an increased focus on technology, data, and workflow compatibility. We recently began presenting the new platform more broadly to current and future users, and the reception has been extremely positive. We look forward to the launch of the new platform later this spring.