Posts by Paul Rowady

About Paul Rowady

Paul Rowady is the Director of Research for Alphacution, a research and strategic advisory platform uniquely focused on modeling and benchmarking the impacts of technology on global financial markets and the businesses of trading and asset management. He is a 35-year veteran of the proprietary, quantitative and derivatives trading arenas.

Contact: feedback@alphacution.com

XTX Enters The Dark

Expanding its footprint in US equities, XTX Markets drops its first 605 report for March 2021. Alphacution uses this event to make some comparisons and offer some interpretations about the evolving US equity market structure...
By Paul Rowady | May 5, 2021 | For Subscribers
Read More →

It’s 13F Season Again. Simplex Trading Goes First

In a world of ultra-fierce competition among proprietary traders, it has become increasingly challenging for newer, smaller players to succeed. We have been keeping a close eye on two players who appear to be bucking this trend above the rest. One of them is option market maker, Simplex Trading. In this Feed post, Alphacution showcases the latest 13F reporting to test for signals of Simplex's ongoing success...
By Paul Rowady | April 28, 2021 | For Subscribers
Read More →

Alphacution Publishes Payment For Order Flow 2020, Part I: Rate Heatmaps

2020 will be remembered for many reasons. In the context of Alphacution’s ongoing research focus, we want to remember 2020 as the first full year of enhanced transparency into the mechanics and impacts of the long-held practice of payment for order flow (PFOF). In this 23-page, 20-exhibit deck, Alphacution presents PART I of its upcoming comprehensive case study, Payment For Order Flow 2020, with a focus on order routing rate heatmaps.
By Paul Rowady | April 27, 2021 | Open
Read More →

The Mother of All 2020 PFOF Charts

Assembling 4 quarterly reports comprised of 12 monthly sets of figures segmented by 3 securities categories and 4 order types across 12 retail brokerage entities and a subset of some 14 wholesale market makers - each number within which, by the way, painstakingly entered by hand - in order to slice and dice an entire annualized data set from any angle and still have everything add up exactly the same was both a pain in the ass and a labor...
By Paul Rowady | April 27, 2021 | For Subscribers
Read More →

And the #1 Market Maker is…

There are many ways to rank prop firms and market makers, given the right data. However, depending on the market or the metric used, rankings will differ. Outside of our case studies, here are some figures we've never shared on the Feed, and the implications are likely to be quite consequential for the road ahead...
By Paul Rowady | April 7, 2021 | For Subscribers
Read More →