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History
The pre–1993 world of electronic trading consisted of Unix
based, inflexible, fragmented technology. Efficient, real–time, high–speed
electronic trading still belonged to the realm of almost science fiction.
Belzberg Technologies Inc. was founded in January 1993 by Sid
and Alicia Belzberg to make true electronic trading a reality and to provide
traders with tools that would not only increase the trading efficiency but also
to allow the traders to trade in a way never possible before.
The company, initially incorporated as Belzberg Financial
Markets & News Inc., introduced its first product to the market in August of
1993. The product was a spreadsheet–based, real–time basket trading application.
The company then went on to rapidly develop a full spectrum of innovative,
flexible, real–time, trading products.
In November of 1993, we incorporated a parent company,
Belzberg Financial Market & News International Inc., in anticipation of
expanding our operations to the United States.
With its products well accepted in Canada, Belzberg initiated
its expansion to the US in the fall of 1995.
1999 was an auspicious year for the company. The rights to the
core component of our intellectual property were recognized by the US Patent
Office with the issuance of Patent Number 5,864,827, for the Protocol
Translation Gateway, a product architected by our COO, Donald W. Wilson. This
innovative piece of software enabled buy–side traders to seamlessly and directly
execute trades on various stock exchanges from one screen.
Continuing steady growth, we expanded our operations in the US
to include brokerage services, by setting up Electronic Brokerage Systems, our
own agency–only broker–dealer. Through Electronic Brokerage Systems, we are able to offer our clients
neutrality and cost efficiency.
Although our focus remained on developing cutting–edge,
world–class technology, our revenue model shifted from one that was technology
based, to one based on brokerage execution fees, thus enabling us to offer our
clients significant cost savings.
In 2000, the company changed its name to Belzberg Technologies
Inc. and listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (symbol BLZ). Building on our core
technology, we also introduced to the market our Options product.
In 2001, we acquired RCS, a CBOE floor brokerage operation, to
offer our clients floor executions, in addition to our electronic execution
services. In addition, we received our second US patent, a spreadsheet trading
application developed by Sid Belzberg (Patent Number 6,134,535).
Today, Canadian, US and European banks and many large and
small financial institutions and hedge funds utilize our technology and our
brokerage services. Our network connects to all US and Canadian stock exchanges
and several European destinations. Our broad spectrum of products encompasses
equities, options and futures markets, and through Electronic Brokerage Systems, (our brokerage division)
a member of the NYSE, CBOE, FINRA, NSCC and OCC, we offer competitively priced
trade executions. The share volume we participate in, through Electronic
Brokerage Systems, is steadily
growing, and the volume of shares executed through our datacenters exceeds 120
million per day1.
With our highly skilled, competent workforce, we continue to
deploy innovative technology and offer our clients increased efficiency and cost
savings, while at the same time we are squarely focused on maintaining
profitability and delivering value to our shareholders.
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Notes:
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1 Past Performance does
not guarantee future results. Every attempt has been made to
verify the accuracy of this information but a rapidly changing business
environment can alter the statements provided within. |
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