RBC Capital Markets bags the 2021 Celent Model Sell Side Award for its Aiden AI-powered electronic trading platform 

RBC Capital Markets won the Celent Model Sell Side Award for its development of Aiden®, an AI-powered electronic trading platform built in collaboration with Borealis AI. This recognition elevates RBC’s vision to be one of the top in the world to unlock the large potential of artificial intelligence for its clients. 

The Celent Model Sell Side Awards was created to give recognition to companies who are utilizing technology in the best way possible with critical success in the capital markets. To win the award, the business initiatives should be able to show clear business benefits, innovation, and technology.

“This award pays tribute to the massive collaborative effort between our traders and AI experts that went into the development of Aiden®, as well as our strong commitment to maintaining a client-centric focus in the delivery of all our services and solutions,” Shary Mudassir, Co-head, Global Electronic Trading and Algorithms, RBC Capital Markets, said. “RBC has been reimagining the future of financial services, with a focus on anticipating client needs and solving for them in innovative ways. New technologies including AI are being developed and employed to add more insights and value to our clients – now and in the future. We look forward to continuing to innovate and build state-of-the-art solutions that move the needle for our capital markets clients.”

Aiden officially launched last October 2020 with a VWAP algorithm available to RBC Capital Markets’ global clients trading in U.S. and Canadian equities. Both RBC Capital Markets and Borealis AI partnered to face one of the largest challenges in the AI industry, applying deep reinforcement learning to an ever-changing environment such as equities trading with measurable and explainable results for the clients. One example to prove this is the recent COVID-19 pandemic and how it has created much market volatility.

“The big takeaway for us during some of the more volatile market conditions of COVID-19 has been that Aiden® was able to recognize the sudden changes in the market, adapt to them, and preserve performance for clients,” Mudassir said. “The Aiden® VWAP algorithm is just the first foundational step in the platform’s evolution. We believe there are many possibilities for how we can expand Aiden®’s ability to provide additional insights for our clients, as well as application to other trading strategies and asset classes.”