CodeStreet, a New York-based provider of trading applications and infrastructure solutions, entered the latency business in March, when it added a monitoring tool to its suite of market data solutions. "Regulatory requirements demand that you be able to verify that your systems do not compromise execution quality as a result of excessive latency," said CEO Howard Pein in an interview at the time. The solution measures latency between points on the distribution infrastructure and from the exchange and sends alerts when limits are exceeded.

At the SIFMA conference, CodeStreet introduced an integrated capacity planning and latency measuring tool that lets firms stress-test their Reuters Market Data System infrastructure by simulating data coming into a feed handler and being distributed to trading applications.

Shawn McAllister, VP of architecture at Solace Systems of Ottawa, Canada, which provides hardware for high-performance trading networks, said a key advantage of the new testing and monitoring services is that "trading firms will not have to build these new systems themselves and don't have to have the subject-matter expertise."

He added a cautionary note: "I think that people will be surprised that their trading performance in terms of latency is not what they think it is and this will cause clients to invest more in their systems and infrastructure."

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