JERSEY CITY, N.J., Dec. 17, 2007 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- Direct Edge ECN LLC today unveiled a new brand identity, coinciding with a re-launch of its website www.directedge.com, that represents a significant milestone in the company's history and further signifies the company's evolution to an independent major market center.
The company transformed itself from a business unit wholly owned by Knight Capital Group to a consortium-owned independent company owned by Knight, Citadel Derivatives Group, and The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., in the 3rd quarter of 2007. New Chief Executive Officer, William O'Brien, was hired to lead the transition, and his team has guided Direct Edge through a period of significant growth. Direct Edge's average daily touched volume has increased from 145 million shares per day in May 2007 to over 635 million shares per day in November 2007, peaking at over 881 million shares on November 8, 2007.
"Direct Edge has only begun to make its presence felt, and we intend to grow the value of our brand as we evolve the company," said O'Brien. "Our new brand identity will allow Direct Edge to be better recognized and strengthen our overall position in the marketplace."
The new branding system refreshes and unifies the look and feel across Direct Edge's sales and marketing platforms in an effort to better communicate important characteristics and value to consumers. The system includes a new logo with a graphic element showing Direct Edge as a central destination point for varying forms of market liquidity, and also includes the company's new tagline: "Everybody Needs Some Edge.(tm)" This tagline is designed to communicate the emergence of Direct Edge as a trading destination of choice for informed customers, and the advantages that Direct Edge's innovative business model makes possible.
"'Everybody Needs Some Edge' is a simple expression that declares that we offer a unique trading environment," said Bryan Harkins, Direct Edge's Head of Sales and Strategy. "Our mission is to give our customers an advantage through innovation."
About Direct Edge
Direct Edge represents the next generation of displayed financial markets. Our dual trading platforms and integration with dark liquidity provides firms with greater flexibility to optimize trades for cost, speed, trading partner, market impact or virtually any other factor. Our innovative business model creates opportunities for the trading community unlike any other market center. This is what the future of trading looks like. More information about the company is available at www.directedge.com.