Global Historical Data Solutions

Penson Worldwide, Inc Extends Suite of Automated, High-Frequency Trading Solutions with Acquisition of Tick Data, Inc.

Nexa Technologies to Offer Tick Data’s Cleaned and Validated Global, Historical Market Data To Black Box , Stat-Arb and Quantitative Trading Clients

DALLAS, TX (January 5, 2005) – Penson Worldwide, Inc., a leading provider of execution, clearing, custody and settlement services for the global securities market, today announced its acquisition of Tick Data, Inc., specialist provider of value-added, historical, intraday financial data. The acquisition, which reflects the Penson Group’s commitment to servicing the global automated trading community, will extend independent subsidiary Nexa Technologies Inc.’s suite of next -generation trading solutions beyond the online, direct access and institutional brokerage trading solutions arenas.

Penson’s acquisition of Tick Data, Inc. will further enhance its flexible and cost-effective technology and global securities processing services within the automated trading arena. Black box, statistical-arbitrage and quantitative trading clients are able to analyze and back-test trading strategies using Tick Data’s unique archive of high-frequency data and technologies and then deploy them seamlessly in real-time using Nexa’s existing market data and direct market access technologies.

Tick Data’s suite of research-quality equity and futures databases is currently used by most of the largest financial institutions and thousands of professional traders worldwide.

Daniel Son, President, Penson Worldwide, Inc., comments: “Tick Data’s proven sets of historical intraday time series data provide a natural compliment to Penson’s high performance trading solutions and infrastructure. As such, we’re delighted to bring the Tick Data solutions and experienced professionals into the Penson fold, operating within our independent technology subsidiary, Nexa Technologies, Inc.”

Tick Data’s product set includes the Tick Equity Database which contains tick-by-tick trade and quota data for every U.S. equity back to 1993, the One -Minute Equity Database which contains historical data on over 3,600 U.S. equity symbols as far back as 1993, and the Global Futures and Index Database which includes tick-by-tick futures and index data as far back as 1974.

Eric Stoop, President, Nexa Technologies, comments: “By combining Tick Data’s one-minute equity data and tick-by-tick futures and index data with Nexa’s existing online, direct access and institutional brokerage trading solutions, Nexa is now able to boast an unparalleled offering to high-frequency automated traders throughout North America and Europe. This acquisition is a natural progression for Tick Data, Nexa Technologies and their respective client bases.”

Thomas Neal Falkenberry, President, Tick Data. Inc., adds: “This acquisition is a significant step for Tick Data’s experienced professionals and our extensive client base. With the rise in statistical arbitrage players, competition between them is intense. The need for reliable, direct access execution and access to reliable real-time data is a natural extension of our value proposition to our existing clients. The combination of Tick Data’s data and technology, Nexa’s best-of-breed trading solutions suite and Penson’s outsourced clearing, custody and settlement infrastructure offering will offer significant opportunities to our respective clients to continue to improve their trading results now and in the future.”

About Penson Worldwide: www.penson.com

Penson Worldwide, Inc. is the holding company for Penson Financial Services, Inc., Penson Financial Services, Ltd., Penson Financial Services Canada, Inc., and Penson Financial Futures, Inc. The Penson Worldwide group of companies provides execution, clearing, custody, and settlement services in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Europe for broker/dealers trading in securities and financial futures, including single stock futures, and fixed income products. Penson Financial Services, Inc., headquartered in Dallas, Texas, has served the clearing needs of all types of broker/dealers since 1995.

Penson Financial Services, Inc. is a member of the Chicago Stock Exchange, NASD, Inc. and SIPC. Penson Financial Services Canada, Inc. is a participating organization with the Toronto Stock Exchange, the Montreal Exchange, the TSX Venture Exchange, is regulated by the Investment Dealers Association of Canada, and is a member of the CIPF. Penson Financial Services, Ltd. is a member of the London Stock Exchange and is authorized and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Penson Financial Futures is a Futures Clearing Merchant member of the National Futures Association.

Penson’s services include:

• Clearing and settlement
• Direct market access execution
• Exchange market hub-hosted connectivity
• Custody
• Penson provides international trading systems through its subsidiary, Nexa Technologies.

About Nexa Technologies: www.nexatechnologies.com

Nexa Technologies, Inc., is a provider of online and direct access trading solutions. Its comprehensive product set incorporates multi-asset direct access trading systems, an Order Management System (OMS), comprehensive data and market access to European & North American equity, options and derivatives exchanges and ECNs.

Founded in 1999, Nexa Technologies is an independent subsidiary of Penson Worldwide, Inc. Nexa has over 100,000 active retail and professional users throughout North America and Europe. It manages up to 200,000 transactions/day and hosts more than 500,000 customer accounts globally.

About Tick Data, Inc: www.tickdata.com

Founded in 1984, Tick Data, Inc., was the first company in the world to offer historical tick-by-tick data on the futures and index markets. Tick Data now provides the cleanest, most reliable historical intraday time series data available on the equities markets as well. The company's technology includes proprietary compression algorithms, price-filtering techniques, and ticker symbol mapping processes used to produce complete, research-ready historical data. From efficient data collection and distribution to seamless integration with third-party analytical software, Tick Data removes the frustration from building and maintaining an historical database.

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Julia Gregory / Kathryn Torpy / Louisa Excell, Cre8 Results Limited
Email: penson@cre8results.com
Tel: +44 (0)20 7734 9199