Douglas Cifu

Douglas Cifu became CEO of Virtu Financial in 2013 and helped lead its 2015 IPO. Virtu is one of the world's largest electronic market-making firms, active across equities, FX, fixed income, and commodities. The firm famously disclosed in its IPO documents that it had only one losing trading day in five years. Cifu has been a consistent and outspoken defender of high-frequency trading's role in markets, arguing that HFT reduces bid-ask spreads and improves market efficiency. He has frequently debated critics including Michael Lewis and Brad Katsuyama in financial media. Under Cifu's leadership, Virtu significantly expanded through the acquisition of KCG Holdings in 2017, nearly doubling its size and strengthening its global market-making presence across asset classes and geographies, and establishing Virtu as one of the most comprehensive electronic liquidity providers serving institutional and retail brokers globally.