What is Dim Fiber?
Optical fiber only partially lit in a fiber optic transmission system (FOTS) employing wavelength division multiplexing (WDM).WDM technology can support a considerable number of wavelengths running simultaneously over a single optical fiber within a cable comprising perhaps a great number of fibers. A dim fiber is one over which not all available wavelengths have been lit and which, therefore, has excess capacity.

Why Dim Fiber?

A dim Fiber customer gets assigned a wavelength in a fiber span that provides flexibility and performance similar to dark fiber with the following benefits:

• Use of fiber span not limited to a specific bandwidth, just a specific wavelength, thus the customer has more control.
• Reduced equipment on the circuit reducing potential outages.
• Reduced equipment on the circuit reducing processing latency.
• Dark Fiber performance at a lower cost.
• Dark Fiber performance with a variety of contract terms closer to customer experience with lit services.

Why CFN Services Dim Fiber Solutions?

• With CFN Services as your partner on your dim fiber plans – CFN will manage and monitor the health of the fiber span via other circuits running on the same fiber span.
• Dim Fiber allows wireless operators to take advantage of the owners economics and cost efficiencies of a managed backhaul solution, which provides lowest per unit cost as the backhaul traffic increases
• CFN takes away the hassle and worry of managing an Outside Plant Network such as relocations, construction, outages, etc. by managing the full solution so as a customer you get only the benefit of dim without the down side.
• For longer spans, CFN can provide mid-span regeneration reducing equipment, new collocations and operational cost and complexity for the customer.

Contact CFN Services to see if Dim Fiber is the solution for you: Contact CFN Now

Webinar: Trading Beyond the Horizon

Trading Beyond the Horizon: Fragmentation Drives Multi-Market Execution Join us for a Webinar on June 30 Learn how to optimize your trading architecture for low latency Space is limited. Reserve your Webinar seat now at: www.a-teamgroup.com/webinar/trading-beyond-the-horizon/ In 2010, financial markets participants will continue to expand their trading activities as liquidity increasingly becomes fragmented, seeking alpha in new markets, best execution in dark pools, arbitrage opportunities across the order book and by implementing high frequency and complex, multi-leg, cross asset class strategies. The successful trading operations will leverage an infrastructure that leverages high-speed long haul and metro communications along with optimized use of proximity and co-location sites to access multiple, geographically dispersed execution venues with the lowest latency. Participants are looking to implement flexible networking architectures to keep pace with market developments, while at the same time they need to retain management control of this strategic capability in order to continually optimize their proprietary trading and customer brokerage businesses. Join us for a webinar where you will hear from, and have a chance to ask questions of, a panel of industry experts who will address the issues of implementing an optimized trading architecture. Speakers: Peter Harris (moderator) President, Americas A-Team Group Mark Casey President CFN Services Gregory E. Smith Vice Chairman Chi-X Global Dan Bergman VP of High Performance Engineering Lime Brokerage LLC Donal Byrne CEO Corvil Date: Wednesday, June 30, 2010 Time: 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM EDT Sponsored & Presented by: Co-presented by: Produced by: System Requirements PC-based attendees Required: Windows® 7, Vista, XP, 2003 Server or 2000 Macintosh®-based attendees Required: Mac OS® X 10.4.11 (Tiger®) or newer After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.

Ultra-Low Latency Connectivity and Proximity Collocation offering for local and international financial institutions and vendors looking to participate in the United States equities, futures and options marketplaces

CFN Services has announced their continued commitment to provide lowest latency connections to all Global Exchanges, expanding and improving latencies to 6 new locations in between New York, New Jersey and Chicago.  CFN Low Latency Global Exchange Infrastructure currently supports over 25 data centers spread out across 7 countries.

The newest locations announced are:

NJ/NY Metro

• 5851 Westside Ave., North Bergen, NJ
• 755 Secaucus Rd., Secaucus, NJ
• 120 W. Passaic, Rochelle Park, NJ

Chicago Metro

• 400 S. LaSalle, Chicago, IL
• 440 S. LaSalle, Chicago, IL
• 10 S. Canal St. Chicago, IL

CFN Services Low Latency Global Exchange Infrastructure is designed to facilitate trading and information exchange in global capital markets where trade execution speed is critical. The solution offers financial services firms such as brokers, hedge funds, exchanges, asset managers, and pre and post-trade services providers a fully managed, highly available optimized infrastructure, providing easy scalability and growth as trading firms enter new geographies and asset classes.

CFN Services is committed to helping Financial Service firms continually lower their latency. Offering customers not just low latency options today, but also for the future by continuing the success of their Low Latency Improvement Plan. Introduced in early 2009, CFN Services has upheld their commitment to continually lower latency for their existing customers. As we know the best latency today, is not the best latency in 12 months, which makes it imperative to choose a partner who is committed and guaranteed to continually work on optimizing their network.

Here is an update of some of the most recent announcements by CFN Services, which enumerate their commitment to the financial services trading market place:

• Drastically reduced latency from Chicago – NY/NJ
• Offering a Latency Improvement Plan Guarantee – Committing to lower latency for today and tomorrow
• Proving bandwidth options from 50mb and up bundled or unbundled to include collocation and multiple locations
• Announcing Loyalty Programs for latency, pricing and promotions
• Continual expansion of the their CFN Low Latency Global Exchange Infrastructure, connecting global exchanges via an Optimized Low Latency Infrastructure

CFN Services has continually set themselves apart in the race for Alpha, due to the intelligence and experience they bring to Network and Proximity Optimization. Utilizing FiberSource®, knowledge based platform which provides them the ability to view all available fiber, including that of Utilities, Carriers, Dark Fiber and Collocation Providers; in order to optimize turnkey network routes or provide custom network solutions specific to a customer’s exact requirements and priorities, allows CFN the ability to ensure that a trading firm’s connectivity plan drives their trading strategy.

CFN Services currently operates a low latency global infrastructure connecting over 20 data centers globally in Toronto Metro, New York Metro, New Jersey Metro, Chicago Metro, Tokyo, Singapore, Hong Kong, Frankfurt, London Metro, and Sao Paulo.

CFN Services, the low latency and infrastructure optimization provider, has announced the completion of extreme low latency metro networking solutions optimized specifically for high frequency trading throughout the New York/New Jersey, Toronto and London financial markets.  The flexibility of CFN’s managed network aims to enable firms to adapt quickly to changes as execution venues and matching engines move and the landscape continues to evolve. Firms can now choose either to proximity host at a new venue collocation facility, or central proximity host and employ the metro connectivity solutions offered by CFN to maintain the lowest latency, without incurring major network conversions involved in data center moves.  Read More

For many years, the only “free” market data was delayed data, released usually after 15 minutes, to provide an indication of the market for non-professionals, while traders would still need to subscribe to expensive real-time prices. More recently, new ECNs and MTFs have begun offering data free of charge to attract trading volumes. And now, these venues are having to balance staying true to their roots with the benefits of-or business need for-market data fees, which contribute significant revenues to the bottom lines of their established exchange rivals. Read More

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Low latency connectivity has enjoyed a resurgence of interest as high-performance trading architectures become a reality. Early interest in the low-latency ‘vision’ may have been interrupted by the global financial crisis, but no matter: low latency is back, and providing the catalyst for the explosion in high frequency trading.

As liquidity continues to fragment – in the US and globally – electronic trading operations are demanding connectivity to a broader array of execution venues. As well as traditional exchanges, traders today need access to alternative trading systems, including electronic communications networks, dark pools and multilateral trading facilities (MTFs). Securing and maintaining a robust, high-performance connectivity solution is key to providing comprehensive market access Download Now

CFN Services, the Low Latency and Infrastructure Optimization Leader, is pleased to announce the completion of extreme low latency metro networking solutions optimized specifically for high frequency trading throughout the New York/New Jersey, Toronto and London financial markets. In light of market fragmentation and the introduction of new ATS and dark pool options; CFN expands their suite of long-haul optimized solutions for global electronic trading firms by delivering the same advantages of integrated optical connectivity throughout full metropolitan areas. The flexibility inherent in CFN’s managed network enables firms to adapt quickly to changes as execution venues and matching engines move and the landscape continues to evolve. Firms can now choose either to proximity host at a new venue collocation facility, or central proximity host and take advantage of the robust metro connectivity solutions offered by CFN to maintain the lowest latency without incurring major network conversions involved in data center moves. Read More

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In 2010, financial markets participants will continue to expand their trading activities as liquidity increasingly becomes fragmented, seeking alpha in new markets, best execution in dark pools, arbitrage opportunities across the order book and by implementing high frequency and complex, multi-leg, cross asset class strategies.

The successful operations – whether they be the proprietary desks of traditional broker/dealers, specialist high frequency and algorithmic traders, or quantitative hedge funds –  will leverage a trading infrastructure that combines high performance analytical, algorithmic and order routing platforms with the lowest latency access to multiple, geographically dispersed execution venues.

Multi-market trading – leveraging a fragmented market landscape – introduces new challenges, even for trading firms that have mastered the complexities of low-latency execution using approaches such as co-location and proximity.  Those mechanisms, while still relevant, provide a less complete solution when trading across markets that are geographically dispersed.

New entrants into the market for connectivity and proximity services include organizations that are themselves market participants, such as sell-side firms offering sponsored access and DMA, and liquidity venues, which are now providing global order routing networks, in some cases channelling order flow to their competitors.

Those service providers join traditional players including telcos, hosting companies and value-added extranet vendors, who often bundle trading applications with connectivity.

The bottom line: For multi-market trading, optimization of long-haul and metro communications links, combined with smart use of co-location, is an imperative for achieving the lowest latency, and this requires an understanding of connectivity offerings at a deep, granular level.

This  industry briefing explains the drivers for fragmentation and multi-market trading, the evolving landscape of market access, and explores connectivity approaches to minimize latency.