KCG Holdings, Inc. was an American global financial services firm engaging in market making, high-frequency trading, electronic execution, and institutional sales and trading.[3] The company was formed on July 1, 2013, upon the completion of the merger between Knight Capital Group, Inc. and GETCO Holding Company, LLC.[4] Global growth equity firm General Atlantic, who had a 25% stake in GETCO, made an additional equity investment at the time of the merger. Rene Kern, managing director at General Atlantic joined the board of directors[5]
On April 20, 2017, KCG announced that it had agreed to be acquired by Virtu Financial for $20 per share in cash in a deal valued at approximately $1.4 billion.[6][7]
History
Getco LLC was founded in 1999[8] by Stephen Schuler and Daniel Tierney, former floor traders in Chicago, and had 400 employees at the time of the merger. The firm's primary business was electronic market making/high-frequency trading, though it also provided execution algorithms and a dark pool through its client services arm, Getco Execution Services.
Knight Capital Group was founded in 1995[9] as Knight/Trimark Group and had about 1400 employees at the time of the merger. Its largest business was market-making in US equities for retail brokerages, though it also provided other services such as electronic execution, dark pools, plus institutional sales and trading. In August 2012, a technological/managerial breakdown subsequently dubbed the "Knightmare" caused Knight to lose $460m in the course of one trading day, nearly putting the firm out of business.[10] In December 2012, it agreed to be acquired by Getco LLC. The merger was approved by the respective stockholders and unitholders of both companies on June 25, 2013.[4]
On July 8, 2013, chief executive officer Daniel Coleman rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange, marking the completion of Knight and Getco's merger and the unveiling of a new corporate identity, KCG Holdings.[11]
In 2014, 27 million shares of Platinum Studios were acquired by KCG Holdings.[12]
In January 2015, KCG Holdings announced it would be selling its foreign exchange trading platform KCG Hotspot to BATS Global Markets for $365 million.[13]
In April 2017, Virtu Financial announced that it would purchase KCG Holdings for US$1.4 billion in cash.[14] The acquisition closed on July 20, 2017.[15]
Category:Companies based in London, United Kingdom
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US$ 1.45 billion (2016) [1] 
US$ 61.1 million (2014) [2]