[February 12, 2014]

TNS Expands ATS Portfolio with IEX Trading

Transaction Network Services (TNS) has partnered with IEX (News - Alert), an alternative trading system (ATS) designed to realign the marketplace around the interests of the investor.

IEX is a FINRA registered broker-dealer and operates as a non-displayed ATS. Unlike other ATS', IEX is owned by the buy-side: a group of mutual funds, hedge funds, family offices and individual investors, including IEX employees. Buy-side firms can access IEX through 70+ broker dealers who have already connected or are in the pipeline to connect to the IEX platform.

IEX will appeal to TNS' existing customers as well as new brokers and institutional buy-side firms that wish to trade in this marketplace. At nominal cost, customers of TNS (News - Alert) can add a trading counterparty connection to IEX on their installed infrastructure within a matter of days. Customers can also leverage IEX's smart order router, which accesses both displayed and non-displayed liquidity at protected venues and protects against latency arbitrage strategies. Ne buy-side firms and brokers can establish connectivity with TNS and have a link to IEX as well as other members of TNS' financial community.

Ronan Ryan, Chief Strategy Officer at IEX, said: "Our mission is to provide liquidity that's sizable, shielded from predatory trading strategies, and seamlessly accessible on IEX and across other National Market System (NMS) venues. It's a tall task, so having the right partners is important. We look forward to our future growth prospects with TNS: an industry leader with a wealth of established relationships."

John Owens, TNS' Vice President of Exchanges and ECNs, said: "TNS is ideally positioned to support IEX with our global network which supports electronic trading across multiple asset classes for both order flow and market data. Our dedicated focus on the institutional financial markets allows TNS to fully comprehend the fast paced environment within which IEX operates and compels us to rapidly implement new client connections accordingly. Whether it is a connection to IEX or another member firm, all TNS customers benefit from the industry-leading service excellence we provide which includes a customer portal monitoring tool.

"IEX's innovative investor focused business model permits TNS to continue to meet the diverse trading needs of our connected global financial community. TNS provides easily scalable, cost-efficient connectivity with rapidly turned up connectivity services for exchanges, just like IEX, their participants and their partners. This will benefit all parties engaged in electronic securities trading by lowering barriers to entry and eliminating workload demands".

TNS' secure trading network will enable IEX customers to access TNS' 1,700 community endpoints, representing buy-side and sell-side institutions, market data and software vendors, exchanges and alternative trading venues.

For further information about TNS please visit www.tnsfinancial.com

For more information about IEX please visit www.iextrading.com

Ends/…

About Transaction Network Services (News - Alert)

TNS is a leading provider of data communications and interoperability solutions.

TNS offers a broad range of networks and innovative value-added services which enable transactions and the exchange of information in diverse industries such as retail, banking, payment processing, telecommunications and the financial markets.

Founded in 1990 in the United States, TNS has grown steadily and now provides services in over 60 countries across the America, Europe and the Asia Pacific region, with our reach extending to many more. TNS has designed and implemented multiple data networks which support a variety of widely accepted communications protocols and are designed to be scalable and accessible by multiple methods.

For further information about TNS, visit www.tnsi.com.

About IEX

Dedicated to institutionalizing fairness in the markets, IEX will provide a more balanced marketplace via simplified market structure design and cutting-edge technology. IEX offers a fair-access platform to any qualified broker dealer. IEX is driven by a team of cross-industry experts with backgrounds spanning market venues, electronic trading, and broker-dealers. IEX is the first equity trading venue owned exclusively by a consortium of buy-side investors, including mutual funds, hedge funds, and family offices.

Learn more at: www.iextrading.com

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