Read the associated feature:
"Buy-side Traders Seeking Alpha In Asia, Looking For Crossing Networks and Dark Pools"

As the buy side trades more in Asia, global asset managers are weighing the benefits of OMS and EMS technology to access the local markets, and many vendors have begun launching products for the region. "EMS is the next step in the electronic world in Asia," says George Molina, SVP and director of Asian trading for Franklin Templeton Investments in Hong Kong, noting that TradingScreen, Tora and Portware have become popular. While Templeton utilizes a proprietary OMS, it is working with Portware as a possible global solution, Molina adds.

In general, asset managers are beefing up their infrastructures for Asian trading. "Fund managers that are beginning to dip their toes into these markets typically have an infrastructure built for the U.S. market, so as they start moving into more-dynamic, more-restrictive, more-funky markets, you need to upgrade your technology," says Hugo Molina, director of trading at Philadelphia International Advisors (PIA).

In the next 12 weeks, PIA expects to go live with the Macgregor XIP system as its OMS for trading in Europe and Asia, Molina relates. "It has multicurrency; all the algorithms are built in; and with the ITG merger, it has access to ITG POSIT and transaction cost analysis tools with embedded pretrade analysis tools," he explains. In the future, Molina says, he probably will add one of the EMSs on top of the Macgregor OMS, noting that REDIPlus has done a great job in Asia.

Because its current OMS, which Molina declines to name, has limited functionality for international trading, right now PIA is accessing all the DMA and algorithms off of the Bloomberg platform. "It allows you to get FIX connectivity right away and it doesn't cost you anything and the brokers are all set up," he says. Kevin Chapman, managing director and head of trading at Nicholas Applegate Capital Management, says his firm "uses FIX extensively so we can route orders to the dealers in Hong Kong or Japan and do direct market access as well." Specifically, NACM uses G-Trade, a wholesale execution service offered via BNY Securities Group that provides access to 65 markets worldwide.

But NACM will implement Latent Zero as its new OMS and EMS by February 2008, Chapman points out. Latent Zero recently was acquired by royalblue group Fidessa, which in September launched its own buy-side multibroker execution platform for Asia, Fidessa EMS.

Other DMA and EMS providers are expanding into Asia also. In March, Neonet, the global agency broker that offers DMA, announced around-the-clock trading into Japanese equity markets. Investment Technology Group is in the process of introducing its Triton EMS systems across Asia Pacific. And global agency brokerage AXES launched GEMS (Global Execution Management System) last month.