Trading platform Vega-Chi has secured £2 million in equity finance in a fundraising led by venture capital firm Octopus Investments.

Trading platform Vega-Chi has secured £2 million in equity finance in a fundraising led by venture capital firm Octopus Investments.

Octopus invested £1.6 million in the London-based business, which launched its European convertible bond trading platform in February last year and will begin a European high-yield equivalent in the second quarter of this year.

The business enables institutional investors to trade directly with each other without having to go through intermediaries. According to a Vega-Chi statement, it has 65 participant businesses and has received more than $20 billion (£12.39 billion) in orders since its launch in February last year.

Founded by chief executive Constantinos Antoniades, the business aims to expand its range of products and increase its market share in electronic trading for fixed income products. Before starting Vega-Chi, Antoniades was a convertible bond arbitrage portfolio manager at Waterstone Capital Management and Castlegrove Capital Management, and earlier an executive director at Goldman Sachs.
 
Antoniades comments, ‘The investment brings to Vega-Chi a strong and value-added partner and will allow us to accelerate our growth in new regions and products.’