James Cawley is Co-Founder & CEO, RTX Fintech & Research.
What were the key theme(s) for your business in 2025?
2025 was focused on delivering long-needed modernization to the interdealer swaps market. Even as nearly 90% of dealer-to-client inquiries had already shifted to electronic channels, interdealer trading continued to rely heavily on voice, exposing a widening gap in market structure. Rising volumes made that disconnect more pronounced, underscoring the inefficiencies of manual workflows, inconsistent fills and limited access to trade-level data.
Firms faced increasing pressure to lower costs and improve operational resilience, and therefore, modernization became the central theme of the year. Our objective was on helping dealers overcome those structural frictions through scalable technology, automation and infrastructure built to support the speed and complexity of today’s rates markets.
What was the highlight of 2025?
The standout development was the increased acknowledgement that the voice-dominated interdealer model is no longer sustainable. In 2024, risk-adjusted interest rate derivatives trading volume rose 15.6% to $366 trillion, and U.S. swap execution facilities processed $22 trillion in notional volume in November 2024 alone. That momentum carried into 2025, intensifying operational strain across interdealer workflows and spotlighting the limits of legacy execution methods.
For RTX, the highlight was working closely with dealers as they accelerated their modernization roadmaps. Institutions moved beyond incremental fixes and began building electronic foundations centered on automation, transparency and efficiency. Seeing that shift manifest in increasing adoption of our platform, as firms sought to streamline execution, reduce costs and access more consistent data, marked a meaningful turning point for the market.
What are your expectations for 2026?
We anticipate 2026 to be a pivotal year in the industry’s transition toward a fully modernized interdealer swaps framework. With volumes still rising and electronic protocols already deeply embedded in dealer-to-client activity, the imperative to bring interdealer markets into structural alignment with the rest of the rates ecosystem will only strengthen. Market participants are increasingly prepared to move away from voice-driven practices in favor of data-rich, electronic execution models that deliver consistency, scalability and real-time risk management.
Our priority will be enabling dealers to capture these advantages rapidly and at scale. This includes providing low-friction electronic execution, embedding automation more deeply into everyday workflows and delivering the capacity required for markets where notional volumes rival the world’s largest asset classes. We expect more institutions to adopt electronic interdealer trading not just for efficiency, but because it will become fundamental to maintaining competitiveness.
If current conditions persist, 2026 should mark the beginning of a more resilient, transparent and structurally modern interdealer environment – one capable of supporting
