When you enter an order to buy or sell a stock, your registered financial professional must decide where to route your order. The most familiar type of execution venue is a traditional exchange. However, other execution venues, including alternative trading systems, single-dealer platforms and wholesalers, have risen in popularity in recent years.
Money market funds are mutual funds that invest in assets that are generally easy to convert to cash. Because money market funds are managed with the goal of providing low volatility and principal stability, they’re often used by investors who want a safe place to store their money short term while also earning interest.
Every day, millions of equity trades are made off the major stock exchanges in what’s known as over-the-counter (OTC) trading. It’s a massive part of the global financial market, with OTC trading in certain types of financial products accounting for billions of dollars in trades daily. Learn more about OTC trading in equities and the unique risks that may be involved.
If you’re interested in over-the-counter (OTC) trading, you might have heard about dark pools, a type of alternative trading system (ATS) that was designed to handle large trades for institutional investors anonymously. Dark pools allow large buyers and sellers to trade large blocks of shares without causing the market to move against them.
