Credit Suisse Expands Corporate Bond-Trading Platform Coverage

Credit Suisse has expanded the coverage of its algorithmic trading platform into high-yield corporate bonds.

The platform, CSLiveEx, enables Credit Suisse to make markets in 6,500 investment grade corporate bonds and now over 1,000 high-yield corporate names. The platform lets Credit Suisse traders automate the pricing for electronically traded bonds on MarketAxess, Tradeweb, and Bloomberg.

Along with the expanded coverage, Credit Suisse has also appointed Julian Pomfret-Pudelsky as global head of credit algorithmic trading in the bank’s Global Credit Products group. He has been with the firm since 2013 and helped developed the algorithmic trading platform.

Pudelsky says the platform—launched last year—was expanded to allow more traders to focus on larger volume trades, the ones usually done over the phone. He says the platform makes trading more efficient since traders spend less time figuring out pricing for each trade.

“We wanted traders to be able to focus on the larger volume trades so we built algorithms to automate the handling of smaller electronic inquiries,” Pudelsky says. “It’s a more efficient use of time and also provides fully automated, firm pricing for customers.”

The platform handles trades under $1 million notional value in investment-grade corporate bonds and high-yield corporate bond trades under $500,000 notional value.

Pudelsky says Credit Suisse wanted to focus first on investment-grade corporate bonds as it was easier to automatically price. High-yield bonds are more volatile, so Pudelsky says it was important that the bank got the pricing right first. He adds that the extension of the platform to high-yield corporate bonds does not in any way affect customer interactions with traders.

Credit Suisse does plan on expanding CSLiveEx’s global reach, but this will depend on customer demand.

“We do eventually plan to expand into different geographies but we’re still in the research phase for that. We want to see where we can move in line with where there is client demand,” Pudelsky says.