Trading & Options · Profile from Trading and Options Research Companion

DRW

The Chicago principal trading firm that Don Wilson founded in 1992 after trading short-term interest-rate options in the CME's Eurodollar pit — a firm that trades only its own money ("no outside investors", DRW website), calls itself at once "a liquidity provider, a risk taker, and a latency-sensitive trading firm", and has repeatedly bought what others were forced or unwilling to hold: three of the Lehman Brothers futures books at the CME's emergency auction in September 2008, a mispriced swap-futures contract in 2010–11 that the CFTC called manipulation and a federal judge did not (30 Nov 2018), and bitcoin, through its crypto desk Cumberland, from 2014. Its story turns on proprietary risk-taking beyond pure market making: DRW's edge is modelling — finding the price that is wrong and holding the position long enough to be paid — and its record shows both what that earns and what it costs in legal fights when a regulator reads an aggressive trade as abuse. DRW publishes no financial statements; no revenue figure in this profile is audited.

At a glance

Founded: 1992 in Chicago by Donald R. Wilson Jr.; named after his initials (DRW website; Wikipedia)
Headquarters: Chicago, Illinois; offices including New York, Houston (energy, from Nov 2017), Austin (RGM, 2017), Montreal (Vigilant, 2013), London, Singapore and Hong Kong (2023) (DRW website; Wikipedia — verify current list)
Ownership / structure: Private; trades its own capital with no outside investors (DRW website); first use of the debt market via a term loan in 2019 (DRW website timeline; amount and terms not checked — verify). Subsidiaries include Cumberland DRW (crypto), Convexity Properties (real estate), DRW Venture Capital and Artemeter (carbon)
Leadership (2026): Don Wilson, founder and CEO (FIA, Risk.net); Cumberland led by Bobby Cho (FIA interview, Oct 2017 — verify current title)
Business lines: Principal trading in listed derivatives, fixed income, FX, commodities (energy since 2002) and equities; options market making; latency-sensitive trading; crypto OTC liquidity (Cumberland, 2014–); real estate (Convexity Properties, 2008/09); venture capital (2011–); carbon-market services (Artemeter, 2024) (DRW website)
Scale (dated, reported): "Over 2,000 employees" and "800+ technologists" (DRW website, 2026); ~2,000 employees in 2025 (Wikipedia infobox); peak processing of "13M+ transactions" in a day and "280K trades" a minute (DRW website — firm claims, undated). No revenue or profit figure is published; none is used here
Regulators: CFTC and NFA (futures and swaps); SEC and FINRA (broker-dealer and, for Cumberland, the 2024–25 dealer case); the exchanges' rulebooks (CME Group, Cboe, ICE); overseas regulators for the London, Singapore and Hong Kong units (verify entity-by-entity)
Signature moves (incl. failures and cases): Founding from the Eurodollar options pit (1992); the CME's Lehman book auction (Sep 2008); Convexity Properties and DRW Venture Capital (2008–11); the IDEX swap-futures trade and the CFTC case (2010–19, DRW won); Cumberland (2014); buying Vigilant, Chopper and RGM (2013–17); carbon markets (Climate Vault 2020, Artemeter 2024); the SEC's Cumberland dealer case and its dismissal (Oct 2024–Mar 2025)

8 strategic moves analysed

Each one gets a full strategy file in the companion: context, the decision, the financing, what happened, and the lesson.

1992
Founding from the Eurodollar Options Pit
Founding / new strategy
2008
Lehman Book Auction at the CME
Large trade or position / counterparty or clearing event (risk transfer from a failed clearing member)
2009
Convexity Properties and DRW Venture Capital
Strategy pivot / diversification into non-trading investment arms
2010
IDEX Swap Futures Trade and CFTC Trial Win
Large trade or position; regulatory, enforcement or legal action (litigated and won)
2014
Cumberland Crypto Desk
New strategy, product or market
2015
Vigilant Chopper and RGM Acquisitions
Acquisition / technology or infrastructure bet
2020
Climate Vault and Artemeter Carbon Markets
New strategy, product or market
2024
SEC Cumberland Dealer Case and Dismissal
Regulatory, enforcement or legal action (contested, then dismissed)

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Deribit

Dunn Capital Management