Banks

The interbank market caters for both the majority of commercial turnover and large amounts
of speculative trading every day. A large bank may trade billions of dollars daily.
Some of this trading is undertaken on behalf of customers, but much is conducted by
proprietary desks, trading for the bank's own account. Until recently, foreign exchange
brokers did large amounts of business, facilitating interbank trading and matching anonymous
counterparts for small fees. Today, however, much of this business has moved on to more
efficient electronic systems. The broker squawk box lets traders listen in on ongoing
interbank trading and is heard in most trading rooms, but turnover is noticeably smaller
than just a few years ago.