Average daily volume traded on Hotspot in April was $54.2bn, down slightly on a strong performance in March, where notional daily turnover topped $55.2bn, owing to a greater number of trading days.
Euro/dollar remained the most popular pairing, accounting almost 42% of overall volumes. Dollar/yen made up 15.52%, and sterling 10.2% of overall volume. Of the commodity currencies, the Australian dollar accounted for the largest share, with 7.43% of total volume.
In April, trading was concentrated in the 10 currency pairs, with the most noteworthy change occurring in the euro, Hotspot’s most-traded currency pair, where turnover increased by more than 6%.
Yen volumes also rose, but by a smaller 1.19%. Sterling was the biggest decliner, with volumes declining 3.73%, while turnover in the Australian dollar declined 3.28%, Hotspot said in a statement.
The Americas edged out Europe as the busiest timezone, with 43.5% of volumes executed there versus Europe’s 42.55%, probably due to there being fewer business days in Europe over April. Asian trading accounted for 13.95% of turnover.
The firm polled seventh among MDPs in Euromoney FX Survey 2011, with a market share of 3.45% by volume. This was up one place on the previous year.
“Although Hotspot FX volume slightly declined in April 2011, we vastly outperformed all competitors in both month-on-month and year-on-year measures,” the firm said in statement (see graph).
| FX volume trends - January 2009 baseline |
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| Source: Knight Capital Group |