Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and UBS Agree to Provide Reciprocal Dark Pool Access

Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS), Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) and UBS (NYSE:UBS) today announced a series of bi-lateral agreements that will allow each firm to offer their respective clients access to each other’s pool of non-displayed liquidity. These arrangements allow algorithmic trading orders of each firm to interact with the U.S. equity liquidity found in three of the largest broker-dealer operated “dark” liquidity pools in the U.S. – Goldman Sachs’ SIGMA X, Morgan Stanley’s MS POOL and UBS’ PIN ATS.

Through this initiative, the firms seek to address the growing complexity of market fragmentation across various non-displayed liquidity venues.

“We’re confident that providing our respective clients access to each other’s liquidity will achieve even better crossing results for our clients in an increasingly fragmented market,” said Greg Tusar, Managing Director, Goldman Sachs Electronic Trading.

“We value our clients’ confidence in us to provide them with additional liquidity with no information leakage in the handling of their orders,” said Andrew Silverman, Managing Director, Morgan Stanley Electronic Trading. “These arrangements will enable us to work with trusted industry participants to deliver the same level of confidentiality our clients have come to expect from us.”

Will Sterling, Managing Director, UBS Electronic Trading, said: “Our clients are looking for incremental liquidity without having to split each order across many different algorithms. These agreements should offer clients access to additional high quality liquidity without making their trading process more complex.”