[ S U R V E Y | A L G O R I T H M I C T R A D I N G ]
Instinet
Instinet achieved an overall average score in this year’ s survey of 5.94, exactly in line with the survey average. This year ' s score was a slight decrease by 0.08 from 2025, as against a huge improvement in 2025 by 0.29 over 2024. Instinet records an increase in selective categories in 2026, with the largest year-on-year growth being breadth of dark pools( 0.24) and price improvement( 0.06). The least improved category, customisation features, observed a decrease by 0.28, followed by anonymity with a decrease of 0.24. The company’ s highest scores were breadth of dark pools( 6.15) and customer support( 6.06).
When compared across the category benchmarks, Instinet outperforms the average in nine key service areas, most notably in breadth of dark pools, which beats the category average by + 0.10 and ease of use, which outperforms by + 0.08.
Instinet continues to focus on the migration of volume to closing auctions. To optimise liquidity, Instinet uses a specialised‘ Close Overlay’ to trade in various ways in and around the close. In addition, other offerings such as Instinet Analytics and Micro Adaptive Sequencer( MAS), provide the traders with additional tools to instantaneously recalculate a
corrected path targeting the best performance.
This year, Instinet received 59 responses, which ranks the agency broker thirteenth in terms of submissions from traditional asset managers. In terms of firm size, 37 % of traders were from large long-only managers with more than $ 50 billion in AUM, followed by mid-sized firms managing between $ 10 and $ 50 billion in assets at 22 %. The UK( 19 %) and Europe( 53 %) collectively represented 72 % of the respondents, with the remainder split across North America( 20 %), Asia-Pacific( 5 %) and Africa( 3 %). Only 13 % of traders stated they were planning to make use of additional algo providers within the next 12 months.
Sample feedback from respondents included the following:
• Delivering consistently strong products from a technical perspective
• Extremely well-run algo providers with great service
• Good technical architecture
• Calls for more support for Auction Volume Discovery order types
INSTINET RATINGS FOR ALGORITHMIC PERFORMANCE
Increased trader productivity |
Reduced market impact |
Execution consistency |
Cost Speed Anonymity Price improvement Customisation |
6.02 6.02 5.97 5.98 6.03 6.01 5.90 5.57
Ease of use |
Order routing logic / analysis |
Customer support |
Execution consulting |
Dark pool access |
Flexibility and sophistication of SOR |
Algo monitoring |
Average score |
6.14 5.77 6.06 5.70 6.15 5.85 5.91 5.94
KEY STATS Overall Outperformer: NO Category Outperformer: X9
6.15 Highest score( Breadth of dark pools) |
5.57
Lowest score( Customisation features)
|
0.24
Most improved( Breadth of dark pools)
|
-0.28
Least improved( Customisation features)
|
|
|
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Issue 87 // thetradenews. com // 71 |