INTL FCStone 2011 Annual Report Download - page 16

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INTL FCSTONE INC.Form10K2
PARTI
ITEM 1 Business
PARTI
ITEM 1 Business
Overview of Business and Strategy
INTLFCStoneInc., formerly known as International Assets
Holding Corporation, a Delaware corporation, together with
its consolidated subsidiaries (collectively the “Company”) forms
a nancial services group employing 904people in o ces in
twelve countries. We provide comprehensive risk management
advisory services to mid-sized commercial customers. We also
utilize our expertise and capital to provide foreign exchange and
treasury services, securities execution, physical commodities
trading services and execution in both listed futures and option
contracts as well as structured over-the-counter (“OTC”) products
in a wide range of commodities.
We are a customer-centric organization focused on acquiring
and building long-term relationships with our customers by
providing consistent, quality execution and value-added nancial
solutions, with the goal of earning returns that allow us to achieve
our nancial objectives.
We provide these services to a diverse group of more than
20,000customers located in more than 100countries, including
producers, processors and end-users of nearly all widely-traded
physical commodities whose margins are sensitive to commodity
price movements; to commercial counterparties who are end-
users of our products and services; to governmental and non-
governmental organizations; and to commercial banks, brokers,
institutional investors and major investment banks.
e Company engages in direct sales eff orts to seek new customers,
with a strategy of extending our services to potential customers
who are similar in size and operations to our existing customer
base, as well as other kinds of customers that have risk management
needs that could be eff ectively met by our services. We plan to
expand our services into new business product lines and new
geographic regions, particularly in Asia, Europe, Australia, Latin
America and Canada. In executing this plan, we intend to both
target new geographic locations and expand the services off ered
in current locations, where there is an unmet demand for our
services particularly in areas where commodity price controls
have been recently lifted. In addition, in select instances we
pursue small to medium sized acquisitions in which we target
customer-centric organizations in order to expand our product
off erings and/or geographic presence.
In the last eighteen months, we have opened our initial offi ce in
Paraguay, as well as additional locations in both Brazil and China
to address the rapid growth in the demand for our services in those
countries. In addition, we have expanded our product off ering,
specifi cally in our Commodity& Risk Management segment,
in both our London and Singapore offi ces with the relocation
of experienced risk management consultants into these offi ces to
address a growing demand for our services in Europe and Asia.
rough the acquisitions of Risk Management Incorporated,
RMI ConsultingInc., Hencorp Becstone Futures,L.C. and
certain assets of Hudson Capital Energy,LLC we have expanded
our commodity product off erings, while acquisitions of HGC
Tr a d i n g , L L C , H G C A s s e t M a n a g e m e n t , L L C , H G C A d v i s o r y
Services,LLC, Hanley Alternative Trade Group,LLC, HGC Offi ce
Services,LLC, the Provident Group, and Ambrian Commodities
Limited have expanded the scope of services which we can provide
to our commercial customer base.
Our strategy is to utilize a centralized and disciplined process
for capital allocation, risk management and cost control, while
delegating the execution of strategic objectives and day-to-day
management to experienced individuals. is requires high quality
managers, a clear communication of performance objectives and
strong fi nancial and compliance controls. e Company believes
this strategy will enable the Company to build a scalable and
signifi cantly larger organization that embraces an entrepreneurial
approach to business, supported and underpinned by strong
central controls.
Each of the Company’s businesses is volatile and their fi nancial
performance can change due to a variety of factors which are both
outside of management’s control and not readily predictable. To
address this volatility, the Company has sought to diversify into
a number of uncorrelated businesses.