Its official – after sources reported last week that BATS Trading’s president Chris Concannon was going to be named chief executive officer, the exchange made it public today.
Concannon’s trem as CEO is effective March 31.
Concannon, a market veteran with 20 years of experience, arrived at BATS as a president in December 2014. His market credentials are impressive – serving six years as executive vice president at Nasdaq leading the operator’s U.S. stock and options markets and also led numerous successful acquisitions and integrations, including Brut, Inet and the Philadelphia and Boston Stock Exchanges.
He was also chief liaison with Nasdaq’s customers and regulators, led the launch of the company’s flagship Nasdaq Options Market and was on the Nasdaq Stock Market board.
Most recently, he was president, chief operating officer and a partner at Virtu Financial, a high-frequency trading firm and leading global electronic market maker, from 2009-2014.
Joe Ratterman, the former chief executive, now assumes the role of chairman of the BATS board, replacing Paul Atkins. Ratterman, who led BATS as CEO for the past eight years, will remain closely involved at the company going forward, while also facilitating Concannon’s leadership transition, the exchange said in a release.
Under Ratterman’s leadership, BATS has transformed into the world’s second-largest stock exchange operator. He helped launch the company in June 2005, became CEO in July 2007 when the firm – then known as BATS Trading – was a growing startup alternative trading system with 25 employees, operating from a single office in Kansas City.
“Being CEO during a time of impressive corporate growth and considerable industry change has been a great privilege and I’m grateful to the entire BATS team for their extraordinary efforts, and for the opportunity to have worked alongside them over the last 10 years. It’s truly been a remarkable time,” Ratterman said.
