Trading firms are notoriously secretive about their use of any technology that they believe delivers an advantage, so gauging actual usage of hardware components such as field-programmable gate array (FPGA) processors can be hard for those outside the firms themselves. But one can gain an idea of demand by looking at recent mergers and acquisitions activity, and the willingness of major chipmakers to invest in these technologies.

Last year saw three significant acquisitions in the space, with