Electronic-Trading Newsflashes

Five sell-side deploy BRASS's new IOI system; MarketAxess reports 160 percent increase in first quarter trading volume; Reuters to distribute MarketAxess Bond Ticker pricing service; BofA Securities launches Electronic Trading Alliance with LineData; Thomson to work with Belzberg to connect AutEx Network to Canadian brokers and equity markets.

MarketAxess reports 160 percent increase in first quarter trading volume.

MarketAxess, the multi-dealer fixed-income trading platform, reported that electronic-trading volume for the first quarter rose 160 percent to $75 billion from $28.9 billion the same period a year ago.

Record first quarter volume increased 19 percent over fourth quarter 2003 volume of $63.2 billion.

Total U.S. high-grade corporate volume reached $45 billion, a 114 percent increase over volume of $21 billion in the first quarter of 2003. This was a two percent increase over fourth-quarter volume of $44 billion. European trading volume for the first quarter totaled $23.6 billion, a 448 percent increase over $4.3 billion in the first quarter of 2003, and a 91 percent increase over fourth-quarter 2003 volume of $12.3 billion.

2 of 5