The 2015 Trading Technology 40: Charles Vice

February 02, 2015

#5 Charles Vice, President and Chief Operating Officer, Intercontinental Exchange

< The 2015 Trading Technology 40: Going with the Flow

Charles Vice

President and Chief Operating Officer

Intercontinental Exchange

Previously Not Ranked

NYSE Euronext, which Intercontinental Exchange acquired in November 2013 for $11 billion, was “a very complex, difficult-to-manage organization,” says Charles Vice. “Our goal was to simplify it.” A member of CEO Jeffrey Sprecher’s management team since Atlanta-based ICE’s inception in May 2000, COO since 2001 and president since 2005, Vice played a major role in postmerger processes that were as much about melding “very different cultures” as they were technical — and quick. ICE, which now has no chief technology officer (longtime CTO Edwin Marcial, No. 1 last year, left the company in October), by summer 2014 had sold off parts of the NYSE Technologies unit and absorbed other data center and market data businesses. Vice, 51, led a team that between August and November integrated London-based Liffe — the NYSE Euronext derivatives affiliate that most closely complemented ICE’s platforms and that the COO characterizes as “our highest interest” in the acquisition. Staying on the acquisition trail, ICE bought security valuation and analytics company SuperDerivatives for $350 million in October and a majority stake in the Holland Clearing House in December, moves that Sprecher said “will accelerate our growth initiatives related to risk management and data services.” Meanwhile, the venerable New York Stock Exchange had a banner year, with an industry-leading $182 billion in proceeds from 545 IPOs, and a new trading platform will be built this year. Vice admits to being surprised by the value of the brand in the listings business: “A brand like NYSE needs to be spotlit.”

The 2015 Trading Technology 40