Shelbourne appoints former bankers to support move into financial services

Spread trading firm Shelbourne Markets is hiring two former bankers to support its attempt to expand into a broad-based financial services provider.

The company, known as Marketspreads until rebrand early this year, has hired Eddie Murphy, who was previously head of treasury sales at Citigroup and worked for AIB, and Fionan MacDonagh, who led corporate treasury sales at Ulster Bank.

Shelbourne is developing a foreign-exchange service offering prices close to the spot rate the time of the transaction, which it claims can save clients large sums when compared to what mainstream banks charge.

Sales and marketing director John McGlade said the company recently handled a £140,000 transaction for a client.

He said the banks charged in the region of €2,200, but Shelbourne was able offer less than a fifth of that sum.

He explained that the spot rate at the time was about 0.844, Shelbourne charged 0.846, while the banks sought 0.8555.

Announcing the appointments and the launch of the new service, chief executive Enrique Curran said the spread-trading firm already offers customers low-cost, tax-exempt access to financial markets.

“So this is a logical addition to the services offered,” he said, adding that foreign exchange is a profoundly uncompetitive market.