Instinet

Company profile

Instinet company profile

Instinet, along with its subsidiaries, provides online security brokerage and electronic trading services. It is an institutional, agency-only broker that serves as the independent equity trading arm of its parent, Nomura. Instinet executes trades for roughly 1,500 “buyside” clients, such as asset management firms, hedge funds, insurance companies, mutual funds and pension funds. Its global trading platform includes algorithms, routing functionality, transaction analytics, and other trading tools and can be reached through Instinet's proprietary front ends, its sales traders or selected third-party systems. Instinet acts solely as an agent for more than 1,500 clients around the world, with the goal of lowering overall trading costs. In addition to its electronic trading suite, Instinet also offers commission management programs, access to third-party, independent research, and the Meet the Street corporate access platform. Separately, Instinet also operates the Chi-X Global platforms, which include Chi-X Canada and Chi-X Japan, and soon, Chi-X Australia and Chi-East. Instinet launched Chi-X Europe in 2007, and subsequently sold off equity stakes in the platform to 19 other financial institutions. Chi-X Europe is today independently operated, with Instinet the largest shareholder in its ownership consortium. Instinet was founded by Jerome M. Pustilnik and Herbert R. Behrens and was incorporated in 1967 as Institutional Networks Corp.