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Case study · Fixed income · RFQ repo

Four contractors who already knew repo, for a platform build that could not wait.

Global market infrastructure business. London and New York.

  • 4 x contract specialists across product, technical delivery, business analysis and project management
  • Trading & Exchange Technology
  • Fixed Income
  • Product
4
Contractors placed

The situation

The business was building a new dealer-to-client RFQ platform for the US Treasury and repo market, inside a major market infrastructure environment.

The platform needed people who could work across several moving parts at once: the product roadmap, technical platform definition, third-party vendor delivery, participant engagement, legal and regulatory readiness, operational launch planning and US repo market expansion.

It needed contract talent who could join quickly, understand complex fixed income execution workflows, and contribute without a long ramp-up.

The brief was to find specialist contract professionals who could sit between the business, product, technology and market-facing stakeholders.

The challenge

01

Specialist market knowledge

The project sat within electronic fixed income, US Treasury and repo workflows. Generic delivery profiles were unlikely to understand the market structure or the execution context.

02

Front-office delivery

The business needed people who could operate close to the desk, not manage timelines from a distance.

03

Vendor and platform coordination

The build ran across internal technology teams, third-party vendors and external market participants.

04

Launch readiness

The platform had to move towards production with legal, regulatory, operational and participant readiness all aligned.

05

Contract speed

Contractors had to land quickly and add value immediately, in a high-pressure delivery environment.

The approach

  1. 01

    Discovery and role definition

    • Worked through the platform build to find where the delivery gaps actually were.
    • Established that the brief was not for standard project managers or business analysts: these contractors needed fixed income awareness and front-office credibility.
    • Defined the target profile around repo, electronic trading, RFQ workflows, product delivery, technical delivery and vendor-facing execution.
  2. 02

    Market mapping and sourcing

    • Mapped the specialist contractor market across trading venues, broker platforms, fixed income technology firms, market infrastructure businesses and capital markets consultancies.
    • Prioritised people who had already delivered electronic trading platforms, fixed income workflows, market connectivity and front-office technology programmes.
    • Looked for the people who could bridge business users, technology teams, vendors and market participants, rather than manage a plan.
  3. 03

    Shortlisting and delivery

    • Presented contract specialists with the blend of product, technical delivery and market-structure experience the build needed.
    • Ran a process quick enough for contract hiring, so candidates were available, commercially aligned and able to mobilise.
  4. 04

    On the programme

    • The four contractors placed worked across the product roadmap, technical platform definition, third-party vendor coordination, participant engagement, launch readiness and US repo market expansion.

The result

  • Four contractors were placed across product, technical delivery, business analysis and project management.
  • Delivery capability added to a new dealer-to-client RFQ repo platform programme.
  • The build got people who already understood repo and electronic fixed income, rather than generic change profiles who would have had to learn it.

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All proof of work