Rethinking ETF execution: Modernising liquidity discovery in a rapidly evolving market
Apr 1, 2026
In a sponsored interview with The TRADE, Aaron Kehoe, head of QwickRoute at MCAP, discusses how ETF growth has outpaced trading protocols and how automated liquidity discovery can modernise execution workflows.
The TRADE speaks with Aaron Kehoe, head of QwickRoute at MCAP, about the evolution of ETF trading and the limitations of traditional execution workflows. Kehoe explains that ETFs inherited equity-style infrastructure despite having distinct liquidity profiles tied to baskets of underlying securities. While manual RFQ workflows improved large-block liquidity discovery, they remain disconnected from high-volume electronic trading. QwickRoute’s aRFQ protocol embeds a competitive, multi-dealer auction directly into existing order-management and execution systems, reducing a process that can take minutes to roughly one or two seconds and extending institutional liquidity access across a wider range of order sizes.
Publications