The top ten questions for dark pool providers

Courtesy of Greenwich Associates, ten questions every institution should ask its dark pool providers:

1. Are you a true dark pool, (i.e., completely anonymous, without any information leakage) or will information regarding my orders be conveyed to potential liquidity providers?
2. Does your platform route orders out of your dark pool or from any other system connected to your dark pool, including your smart order router, to ECNs, ATSs or any other external source?
3. If you allow indications of interest (IOIs), is it an opt-in or an opt-out process or will this decision be made for me?
4. What information regarding my order will be included in an IOI (symbol, side, size, and/or price)?
5. What type of order flow populates your dark pool (i.e., proprietary orders? retail orders?)?
6. How do you count matched volume (single or double count) in your dark pool for purposes of what is reported to the tape and advertised, and are orders that are routed out of your dark pool and executed by another party counted toward your own volume?
7. Do you match within the spread or at the spread?
8. What anti-gaming controls are in place?
9. Do you have a minimum size limit?
10. How will my orders interact with your proprietary orders in terms of priority?