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How has the trading experience been altered over the last few years in light of current market conditions ? During my 19 years of working prior to February 2020 , there was always a strict understanding that no one in equity trading would ever be able to work from home . Then , suddenly , the Covid pandemic hit and automatically the trading experience changed in terms of how we did things and how we interacted with brokers . Initially , during the early Covid months , with the periods of high volatility and where spreads widened , we saw people tend to trade in different ways than they had previously . There was a clear increase in over the day trading , with traders trying to be as passive as humanly possible to cover themselves in case of intraday news flow . Liquidity sourcing became difficult primarily because some of the larger market makers were trying to reduce the risks for themselves through smaller risk sizes . From a UBS AM perspective , we didn ’ t really see this but it had a knockon effect . Now , with a macro and geopolitical environment that remains challenging , we are seeing certain brokers succeeding because of how they have changed their models , while others have suffered because they haven ’ t adapted as quickly or innovated in this new market .
How have you altered your strategies to mitigate these conditions ? Alongside the active managers , UBS AM has a sizeable passive index business that has grown exponentially in the last few years . The sheer makeup of our flow has altered due to this , so we ' re having to factor that into
60 // TheTRADE // Q4 2022