Our Futures Segment
Our futures segment offers execution and related services for exchange-traded
futures and futures options on major U.S. and European exchanges. We offer futures
services through our regulated FCM, GAIN Capital Group, LLC. In 2014, we expanded
our futures business by acquiring a majority interest in Global Asset Advisors,
LLC ("GAA"), a Chicago-based futures brokerage firm that markets to
and services clients through Daniels Trading, an online futures brokerage targeting
retail and professional traders. At the same time, we also acquired a majority
interest in Top Third Ag Marketing, LLC ("TT"), which uses options-based
hedging strategies to help clients manage the risks of agricultural production.
Our Institutional Segment
Through our institutional segment, we provide agency execution services and
offer access to markets and self-directed trading in foreign exchange, commodities,
equities, options and futures via an electronic communications network, or ECN,
through our GTX platform. We also offer high touch services through a team of
institutional sales and trading employees.
Our Retail Segment
We provide our retail customers around the world with access to a diverse range
of 12,500 global financial markets, including spot forex and precious metals
trading, as well as “contracts for difference”, or CFDs, which are
investment products with returns linked to the performance of underlying asset.
We offer CFDs on currencies, commodities, indices, individual equities, bonds
and interest rate products. In the United Kingdom, we offer spread bets, which
are investment products similar to CFDs, but that offer more favorable tax treatment
to residents of that country. We offer these products under the diverse regulatory
environments in which we operate. For example, because of U.S. regulations,
neither we, nor our subsidiaries, offer CFDs or spread bets in the United States
or to U.S. residents.