Trading Room Opens At Queen's

The first financial trading room to operate in Northern Ireland opened today at Queen's University, to provide a learning environment for students of financial services and technology.

The First Derivatives Trading Room (FDTR) replicates the stock exchanges of New York and London.

Based at Queen’s University Management School at Riddel Hall, the facility will give students the experience of trading in a busy stock exchange, with the capacity to deal in real-time equities, bonds, foreign exchange and derivative instruments.

Students will have access to 12 trading stations (capacity of 24 students at a time), a real-time electronic ticker tape featuring financial information feeds from Bloomberg, two large-screen displays providing live coverage of CNBC, CNN, and other financial networks, and software for trading, deal capturing, settlement, analytics, pricing, portfolio management, derivatives pricing, and other finance-related challenges.

The Trading Room has been funded by First Derivatives plc, a Northern Ireland provider of software and consulting services to the global capital markets industry, and Invest Northern Ireland.

Speaking at the official opening, Professor Donal McKillop from Queen's University Management School said: "The opening of the First Derivatives Trading Room illustrates both Queen’s commitment to delivering a world-class experience for its students and its status as an employer-attuned university.

"With first-hand experience of the high-pressure atmosphere of the trading room, Queen’s finance students will now have even more of an edge in the global job market."

Brian Conlon, CEO of First Derivatives plc, both a graduate and honorary graduate of Queen's, said: "Partnerships like this one between First Derivatives plc, Queen's, and Invest NI, create synergies between the world of business, government and academia and are exactly what's needed to drive the development of Northern Ireland’s knowledge economy."

(NE)