Waters Rankings 2026: Best outsourcing service provider—Northern Trust

Overview

Northern Trust’s outsourced trading solution, known as Integrated Trading Solutions (ITS), utilizes an agency-only operating model and access to high-quality liquidity, backed by integrated front-, middle-, and back-office services. It combines with Northern Trust’s Foreign Exchange services to offer asset managers and asset allocators an end-to-end outsourced solution—from trade execution through to FX execution, settlement and post-trade processing—simplifying operations, mitigating risk and improving execution outcomes.

The solution

Northern Trust’s agency-only brokerage model, combined with a broad and diverse global broker network, is designed to deliver to clients unconflicted access to liquidity. This is complemented by the firm’s FX capabilities, including an option of an algorithm-based matched principal execution model designed to provide high-quality liquidity access, as well as transparent and consistent FX outcomes. Together, these deliver seamless outsourced trading workflows to clients.

Secret sauce  

Northern Trust cites its globally integrated, multi-asset execution platform, delivered through a 24/6 “follow-the-sun” operating model across established trading hubs as a core differentiator. This structure provides clients with continuous access to liquidity and experienced traders across regions, ensuring consistency of execution irrespective of market or time zone.

Recent milestones

Northern Trust has developed a number of targeted platform improvements over the past 12 months focused on automation, resilience and client transparency. These include continued development of fixed-income automation capabilities, reducing manual intervention across order workflows and supporting more scalable global delivery, alongside enhancements to FX workflow integration and business continuity planning for outsourced trading clients. Significant developments also include the appointment of Virtu Financial as Northern Trust’s independent TCA provider for its ITS clients, reflecting the strength of its unified, multi-asset platform and advanced analytics capabilities.

Product roadmap

Northern Trust is developing client-facing and data-led capabilities to improve transparency and interaction. These include the development of a global client portal, providing real-time access to reporting, documentation and query functionality across trading and FX activity, alongside continued investment in AI and machine learning capabilities to enhance data processing, reporting accuracy and operational efficiency. These initiatives are designed to improve the speed, precision and consistency of client outcomes while maintaining strict governance, embedded human oversight and secure deployment within Northern Trust’s controlled technology environment.