Thomson Reuters to expand instant messaging

Thomson Reuters Corp. plans to expand its Eikon instant-messaging platform to include customers of FX Alliance LLC, an electronic foreign-exchange trading platform acquired last year, writes William Launder of The Wall Street Journal.

Launder writes, “The move is Thomson Reuters’s latest effort to break Bloomberg LP’s hold on the messaging market, seen as a key function among financial-data terminal providers.

“Thomson Reuters will integrate approximately 1,300 clients from FX Alliance, also known as FXall, onto Eikon’s existing chat function, which currently reaches around 190,000 users. David W. Craig, president of Thomson Reuters financial and risk division, said the integration is part of a broader effort by Thomson Reuters to tap what Mr. Craig referred to as a “new paradigm of connectivity,” for the financial industry and for clients ranging from corporate treasurers to traders and fund managers.

“Thomson Reuters said there was minimal overlap between existing users of the Eikon messaging service and the FX Alliance customers.

“The integration is another step to establishing Thomson Reuters’s Eikon desktop trading product, which at least initially was slow to gain traction with bank clients. The number of installed Eikon platforms grew 30% during the second quarter to 61,000 desktops, Thomson Reuters said last week.”

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