Penson Worldwide has forged an introducing/carrying broker agreement with Orion Securities Inc.
Since the agreement was signed in the second quarter of 2004, Penson has been providing clearing, settlement, custody, bookkeeping and administration for Orion’s Canadian-wide accounts.
Orion’s decision to change outsourced suppliers for its back office processing activities was made on the back of a number of interviews with alternative clearing firms.
Prior to appointing Penson, Orion also considered the self-clearing option. However, Orion said it can reap significant savings and achieve cost efficiencies by outsourcing its back-office services, thus releasing funds for infrastructure upgrade and other operating needs.
Planning for Orion’s conversion to Penson started in January of this year with a live-date planned for the middle of 2004. Penson seconded a full-time employee to the Orion offices for several months and implemented the actual conversion over two weekends with 15 staff members running the process.