Dow Jones Launches Specialized News and Information Initiative in Global Foreign Exchange

NEW YORK, Jan. 17, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Dow Jones & Company is combining news and technology resources to deliver an important new information product to foreign exchange market participants. Marshalling the global editorial resources of Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal with advanced technology from its Financial Markets business, Dow Jones will launch a new real-time information service called DJ FX Trader in the coming months.

"This combination of news and technology is another major content initiative from Dow Jones and one of our most significant yet," said Les Hinton, chief executive officer of Dow Jones. "We are leveraging our scale, our editorial and our technology to deliver highly relevant, high-value news and data to specific audiences. With our history of providing trusted information and analysis to the financial and FX communities, choosing this fast-growing asset class was a natural next step."

DJ FX Trader is an information application that provides exclusive news, analysis and real-time opportunities to help customers better direct their market and currency trading strategies. For its customers, the product offers access to breaking FX news ahead of the broader market and other exclusive content. DJ FX Trader is a key addition to Dow Jones' portfolio of FX trading products, which includes several FX-specific wire and commentary services.

The backbone of DJ FX Trader is the breaking news and analysis provided by Dow Jones' global team of 2,100 journalists in 90 bureaus, including a team of 100 journalists dedicated specifically to covering news vital to FX markets.

"The House of Medici made money from foreign exchange – in our age, it will be Dow Jones. We will provide market-moving news and alerts, unique statistics and incisive commentary backed by the full weight of our news organization and supported by high-speed delivery technology. Currencies were once merely a measure, but they are now a global asset class," said Robert Thomson, editor-in-chief of Dow Jones and managing editor of The Wall Street Journal.

The FX market averages $4 trillion in turnover daily, according to the Bank for International Settlements. That market is expected to more than double to $10 trillion by 2020, according to UBS AG. Institutions globally today spend more than $1.7 billion annually for FX news and information, according to a Burton-Taylor International Consulting LLC study.

Leading the FX news team is: Jim Pensiero, deputy managing editor of The Wall Street Journal; Gabriella Stern, managing editor of DJ FX Trader; and Rick Stine, senior editor of Dow Jones Newswires.  Dow Jones' Financial Markets team is led by Joe Lanza, president, with managing director Rob Passarella and Ian Doull, director, spearheading the FX product initiative.  

The FX reporting team draws from across the expertise of Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal in addition to new hires. Journalists will be based in strategic locations around the world to capture the local angle on currency flash points while providing the global context for the FX market.

DJ FX Trader was designed utilizing input from some of the world's largest global FX market participants. Dow Jones' initiative is focused on serving the most active institutions in the FX market.

DJ FX Trader follows several successful product launches in 2010 at Dow Jones. The Wall Street Journal created new news, circulation and advertising opportunities with the launch of its Greater New York section and the expansion of its weekend edition with WSJ Weekend. Investments in cutting edge technology also yielded the Journal's award-winning iPad application as well as Wall Street Journal Professional Edition, which combined the news and analysis of WSJ.com with the discovery technology of Factiva.

For more information on Dow Jones, visit www.dowjones.com.

About Dow Jones

Dow Jones & Company is a global provider of news and business information and a developer of technology to deliver content to consumers and organizations across multiple platforms. Dow Jones produces newspapers, newswires, Web sites, apps, newsletters, magazines, proprietary databases, conferences, radio and video.  Its premier brands include The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones Newswires, Factiva, Barron's, MarketWatch, SmartMoney and All Things D. Its information services combine technology with news and data to support business decision making. The company pioneered the first successful paid online news site and its industry leading innovation enables it to serve customers wherever they may be, via the Web, mobile devices and tablets. The Dow Jones Local Media Group publishes community newspapers, Web sites and other products in six U.S. states. Dow Jones & Company (www.dowjones.com) is a News Corporation company (Nasdaq: NWS, NWSA; ASX: NWS, NWSLV; www.newscorp.com).

SOURCE Dow Jones & Company