This February sees the arrival of our new COO and Deputy CEO Ian Cohen, who takes over from current COO Ian Firla and joins us after spending five years in the senior role of Managing Director, Global Head Market Structure and Execution Strategy at HSBC Global Asset Management. Prior to this, he was Global Chief Strategy Officer and COO of HSBC Equities, where he was based in London and Hong Kong. During his time in Asia, Ian also served as Chairman of HSBC Securities in Taiwan and Singapore, and Chairman of the Asia Securities Industry & Financial Markets Association.

Ian’s background in senior leadership roles is vast, including Chief Executive Officer of Jiway Broker Services, the cash equities exchange created by Morgan Stanley and OM Group, as well as European Head of External Risk Assessment with Morgan Stanley, Global COO of Technology for Barclays Capital and IT Director for Clearstream. His presence will no doubt prove invaluable as we continue to forge ahead with our bold restructure from independent trading firm into an inclusive multi-disciplinary trading and educational platform courtesy of ZISHI’s world-class digital learning.

Ian Cohen takes over from Ian Firla who, after 10-years as our longstanding COO will move into a newly created role: Head of Innovation. In his role, Mr Firla will focus on long-range ideas generation and evaluate where OSTC can apply technology from unrelated industries to generate disruption and create tangible value.

Lee Hodgkinson, CEO, commented on the appointment:

“Ian Cohen is a well-known and highly regarded industry veteran, with 30-years of experience and a proven track record at senior levels in the trading and asset management businesses across the world. He will significantly strengthen our executive team and improve our cognitive diversity. I am greatly looking forward to working with him as we continue our bold restructure, from an independent trading firm into an inclusive, multi-disciplinary trading and educational platform, with our ZISHI suite of tools and technologies.”

“I would like to thank Ian Firla for his significant dedication and material contribution to the firm as COO and look forward to our continued work together in his new innovation role.”