The 2014 Tech 50: Ron Levi

< The 2014 Tech 50: Moving Out of the Lab and Into the Cloud

18
Ron Levi
Chief OperatingOfficer
GFI Group
Last year: 20

The interdealer brokerage’s lot is not all that happy these days. Like rivals such as ICAP (see Michael Spencer, No. 14), GFI Group faces an unsettled regulatory environment and volume and volatility trends that have constrained income from many over-the-counter products. Although New York–based GFI’s total first-quarter revenue was off a slight 1.5 percent year-over-year, to $241 million, April was down 8 percent. “We just have to cope,” says Ron Levi. Still, the 51-year-old COO notes, “all we do is innovate, innovate, innovate.” That story is written across an ever-expanding catalogue of products and services developed on in-house technology, from the 2003 launch of CreditMatch to the 2013 formation of swaps execution facility GFI Swaps Exchange. Half of first-quarter Americas fixed-income product revenue came from electronic matching. What’s more, technology sales are strong: Software, analytics and market data revenue grew 16 percent in the first quarter, to $26 million; the Trayport trading systems unit was up 19 percent. “Running a technology company is not new to us,” says Levi, who joined GFI in 1993, became COO in 2006 and engineered the Trayport acquisition in 2008. Now he is selling GFI platforms to major banks. HSBC Holdings became the first “white label” user last year, and others are knocking on GFI’s door as they consider cost-effective approaches for single-dealer fixed-income businesses.

The 2014 Tech 50

1 Dave Cross	1	3 IAN CURCIO 2011	4 FayFoto/Boston	5 Teri Pengilley
Thomas Secunda Bloomberg	Jeffrey Sprecher Intercontinental Exchange	Catherine Bessant Bank of America Corp.	Stephen Neff Fidelity Investments	Lance Uggla Markit
6	7	8 Photographer:Charlie Simokaitis	9	10 Mark McQueen
Robert Goldstein BlackRock	David Craig Thomson Reuters	Phupinder Gill CME Group	Anna Ewing NASDAQ OMX Group	R. Martin Chavez Goldman Sachs Group
11	12	13	14	15 Christopher Elston
Deborah Hopkins Citi Ventures	Dan Mathisson Credit Suisse	Daniel Coleman KCG Holdings	Michael Spencer ICAP	Michael Bodson Depository Trust & Clearing Corp.
16	17	18 Todd Plitt	19	20
Joe Ratterman BATS Global Markets	Dominique Cerutti Euronext	Ron Levi GFI Group	Gaurav Suri D.E. Shaw Group	Charles Li Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing
21 Larry Lettera/ Camera 1	22	23	24 XT	25
Lou Eccleston S&P Capital IQ	Lee Olesky Tradeweb Markets	Richard McVey MarketAxess Holdings	Seth Merrin Liquidnet Holdings	Antoine Shagoury London Stock Exchange Group
26 Production	27 Wayne R. Martin	28	29 Thorsten Jansen	30 Adam B. Auel
Christopher Perretta State Street Corp.	Kevin Rhein Wells Fargo & Co.	Peter Carr Morgan Stanley	Hauke Stars Deutsche Börse	Robert Alexander Capital One Financial Corp.
31	32	33 Paul Elledge	34	35 Stephen Brashear
David Gershon SuperDerivatives	Chris Corrado MSCI	Joseph Squeri Citadel	Tanuja Randery BT Global Services	John Bates Software AG
36	37	38	39 Photo Credit: Kevin Irby	40
Gary Scholten Principal Financial Group	David Gledhill DBS Bank	Simon Garland Kx Systems	Cristóbal Conde FinTech Innovation Lab	Jeff Parker EidoSearch
41	42 Jeff Smith Photo	43	44	45
Kim Fournais & Lars Seier Christensen Saxo Bank	Kenneth Marlin Marlin & Associates	Tyler Kim MaplesFS	Jim McGuire Charles Schwab Corp.	Jim Minnick eVestment
46	47	48 tomohisa ichiki	49 David Poultney	50 A.E. Fletcher Photography
Steven O’Hanlon Numerix	Sebastián Ceria Axioma	Yasuki Okai Nomura Research Institute	Niki Beattie Market Structure Partners	Mas Nakachi OpenGamma