Weeden & Co, a full-service institutional broker in Connecticut and Pragma Financial Systems, a New York-based quantitative financial software provider, released OnePipe Lifeguard, the second-generation, anti-gaming logic available through OnePipe Optimal Liquidity Management System.

OnePipe is the firms' joint trading network built to access the many non-displayed liquidity sources, or dark pools, in the U.S. markets system.

According to Weeden and Pragma, OnePipe Lifeguard's enhanced anti-gaming logic detects and deters more styles of price manipulation strategies without compromising OnePipe's crossing rates.

By monitoring trades and quotes across markets over a rolling, adjusted time window, Lifeguard estimates a fair, manipulation-free price and sets trading limits to prevent adverse crosses.

"Buyside traders tell us that anti-gaming protection is their greatest concern because gaming strategies are becoming more prevalent within passive liquidity sources," Douglas Rivelli, managing director at Weeden & Co said in a release.

"It is a bit unnerving for the buy-side to know that they are only as protected as the weakest destination of all the dark pools that they go to," said Peter Fraenkel, Director of Quantitative Services at Pragma Financial Systems.