Nomura's agency brokerage Instinet has identified futures and foreign exchange as the products likely to spearhead its expansion into new asset classes, a move which underlines the industry’s efforts to combine the trading of once-distinct products.

Instinet has long been synonymous with electronic cash equities trading, but since its acquisition by Nomura in 2007 the Japanese bank has harboured desires to transform it into an agency broker trading multiple asset classes.