Verizon Targets Traders With High-Speed Network

Verizon Communications is looking at Wall Street as it attempts to draw new customers with yet another high-speed network. The telecommunications heavyweight, which boasts that its Verizon Wireless has the fastest wireless broadband network, is set to unveil a new service this week targeting traders for whom shaving milliseconds off deals can mean a difference of millions of dollars.

Verizon is seeking to expand in an area dominated by lesser-known companies. Its upgraded network will link the Chicago and New York metropolitan areas, allowing trading at speeds topping out at 14.5 milliseconds round trip between the two cities, said Chandan Sharma, global managing director of Verizon Financial Services. That's as much as a five-millisecond improvement over Verizon's current offerings, he said. "Milliseconds make a big difference in this market," Sharma said. The network may help Verizon cash in on a growing market as more companies automate their equity and futures trading to attempt to take advantage of minuscule price fluctuations occurring over fractions of a second. Such high-frequency trading accounted for more than half the volume on U.S. stock exchanges in 2011, according to the research firm Tabb Group.