Hazem co-founded OptionsCity in 2006 and serves as President and CEO. Before that, he worked as a Director in the Software Department at Chicago Trading Company (CTC). Hazem brings a wealth of knowledge in building trading software. Hazem had a leading role in architecting and building the company’s main electronic trading and market making engine and interface. Within a short period of time, that system took the company’s electronic trading revenue to an explosive growth. Hazem also had a role in the creation of a software development process with the implementation of a support process and a management control system. Prior to that, Hazem worked at SSI as a Software Engineer building real-time embedded systems solutions. Hazem has a Bachelor’s degree from the Illinois Institute of Technology, and was a scholar in the IIT Leadership Academy.
Management Team
Hazem Dawani, President & CEO
Victor Glava, VP Dev. & CTO
Victor co-founded OptionsCity in 2006 and serves as VP of Development and CTO. He contributes his vast integration experience to the core of OptionsCity. Prior to OptionsCity, Victor was the Associate Director in the Software Department at Chicago Trading Company (CTC). At CTC, Victor led a team of developers and implemented back-end solutions and exchange connectivity to exchanges such as the CBOE, ISE, and EUREX. Through his superior technical skills, the company was able to expand its electronic trading capabilities across seven exchanges. Prior to that, Victor held senior development positions at companies such as Tellabs and ComEd. Victor has a Master’s degree in Computer Science and a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology.
Rudy Fasouliotis, VP Services
Rudy co-founded OptionsCity in 2006 and serves as VP of Services. Prior to OptionsCity, Rudy was with Oracle (previously Stellent) where he was a Senior Software Engineer. Stellent was acquired by Oracle and is a global provider of content management software solutions. Rudy worked there for six years and held positions from Support Engineer to Senior Software Engineer. Prior to that, Rudy held positions at several consulting companies such as Bowne and RTI. His positions ranged from network consulting to software development. He brings a vast amount of software experience to OptionsCity® in networking support and customer relations. Rudy has a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology.
Steve Kosanovich, VP Sales
Shortly after OptionsCity was formed, Steve joined the company in 2007 as the VP of Sales. Steve’s background includes being the NE Sales Manager for Original Software, a leading developer of database testing software. Before that, Steve was both an independent and a firm trader for 15 years. He traded equities, commodities, and options around the world and has a vast amount of experience upon which to conceive and execute our sales strategy. Steve’s contact portfolio and exchange-trading know-how brings access to niche and mainstream markets for OptionsCity®. In addition, his thorough understanding of technology and risk management in today’s marketplace is a major asset to our organization. As a previously appointed Vice President with Bank of America, he oversaw the implementation of a new trading system and managed the options desk. Steve has a Bachelor’s degree in Engineering from Vanderbilt University.
Douglas Tucker, Gen. Counsel
Douglas brings significant legal and business experience to OptionsCity as he represented middle market and startup entities in addition to publicly traded companies. Before joining OptionsCity, as a partner at Quarrels & Brady LLP, he practiced in the areas of securities law, mergers and acquisitions, private equity and venture capital transactions, and general corporate matters. His experience includes such transactions as: advising numerous Boards of Directors on M&A transactions, structure and funding of several early stage high tech related businesses, later stage funding transactions by various VC and Angel investors, representing issuers in approximately 20 initial public offerings, and SEC registration of $1.4 billion of debt securities for private equity fund portfolio company.
Douglas also served as chair of the Firm’s China Law Group and chair of the Firm’s Securities Practice in the Chicago office. Douglas earned his B.A., Magna Cum Laude, from Michigan State University and his J.D. from Northwestern University.
Margaret Wiermanski, COO
Margaret has over thirty years industry experience focused on the financial management, operations and compliance functions of exchange traded derivatives. She has held senior management positions with three proprietary trading firms, most recently as the COO of Chicago Trading Company (CTC). Those prior affiliations provide Margaret with a first-hand understanding of most derivative products from the perspective of liquidity providers and hedge funds. In all of these firms she developed and installed policies and procedures that conformed to industry best practices for accounting and financial management reporting, control and compliance functions and contract administration. She also spearheaded the development of efficient workflow processes and designed technology resource allocation procedures. Margaret has been actively involved in many industry forums and committees and is highly regarded within the US exchange community.