-- Retail Customers Have Greater Ability to Manage Risk and Leverage Capital --
NEW YORK, October 10, 2007 – Lightspeed Holdings announced today that its first retail automated trading client began utilizing portfolio margining to potentially increase its capital leverage and margin flexibility when trading.
Lightspeed Trading received approval from its clearing firm, Penson Financial Services, Inc., in July to offer the service to qualified customers.
"The commencement of portfolio margining is an important milestone and helps raise awareness of this powerful risk based margin methodology among our sophisticated, risk aware hedge fund and high-net worth client base," said Andrew Actman, Chief Strategy Officer, Lightspeed Holdings, LLC. "Our traders are active and portfolio margining gives them the ability to more effectively manage risk and leverage capital." Mr. Actman noted that only clients who pass a more stringent approval process are eligible to use portfolio margining.
The recently approved regulatory rule change to traditional Regulation T margin requirements permits eligible customers to use a portfolio or risk based method when calculating risk across a diversified investment portfolio, thereby more accurately reflecting the actual risk of the positions within the portfolio and, as a result, potentially increasing a customer's leverage. Currently, portfolio margining is available for U.S equities and equity options.
About Lightspeed Holdings
Headquartered in New York City, Lightspeed Holdings operates through three wholly-owned subsidiaries:
Lightspeed Technologies, LLC serves as the Company's technology development subsidiary. Lightspeed develops and operates the Lightspeed Direct Market Access trading software application, the Lightsource real-time risk management application and the Middle Office Technology suite. Utilizing a number of proprietary technologies, Lightspeed offers real-time market data platforms and direct-access trading systems to broker-dealers, institutional entities and professional traders.
Lightspeed Professional Trading, LLC and Lightspeed Trading, LLC operate as fully disclosed introducing broker-dealers and FINRA and NFA members. They offer securities and direct access brokerage, trading and advanced order routing services to their customers utilizing Lightspeed's software products.
Sloane & Co.
Mike Boccio
(212) 446-1867
mboccio@sloanepr.com