How Hanweck Got Here

Jerry Hanweck started his career as a Microsoft programmer – when the stock was still trading below $20 – but he knew a career in programming wasn’t the right path for him. Jerry transitioned into the futures industry, then moved into the equity options space. He even went back to school to earn a PhD in managerial economics. 

After a stint in property development in Vegas, Jerry reconnected with his former colleague, Mike Hollingsworth, to create a consulting firm. However, Jerry and Mike quickly realized there was a great opportunity to leverage new technology to provide real-time, high performance risk management analytics. 

Jerry and Mike knew from their prior experience in equity derivatives that desks were lacking fast, powerful options analytics solutions. So when more advanced graphics processing units (GPUs) hit the market in the mid-aughts, they knew they could use this technology to underpin the tools they wanted to develop and disrupt the options market with real-time, highly insightful analytics that would help investors see the full picture.  

This early experimentation with GPU performance in 2006 built the foundation for Hanweck Analytics.  Firms were dealing with increasingly electronified options markets and it was clear that advanced risk and margin analytics were the answer to staying competitive in the new environment. 

But as the financial crisis came to fruition, markets become more volatile and their client base began to dwindle. While challenging, the stressed markets were further proof that real-time analytics were essential.   Around that time that the International Securities Exchange, the first all-electronic options exchange, was looking for a firm that could help improve its front-end execution system and data feeds. It invested in Hanweck and the team delivered. This proved to be a key momentum booster for the still-small firm to do ever bigger things.  

Over the 2010s, Hanweck, powered by the parallel processing prowess of GPUs, continued its penetration into the technology stacks of sophisticated derivatives players by providing high quality, real-time analytics.  

Its leadership as an early quant finance pioneer and innovator, alongside its growing footprint, did not go unnoticed. In 2020, Cboe acquired Hanweck Associates to form Cboe Hanweck.  

“Everything was aligned with Cboe – it was a great fit,” Jerry says. "It has only gotten even better over the past few years as our Data and Access Solutions (DnA) team has really come together to provide top-tier services to meet the needs of every investor."