Central counterparty LCH.Clearnet has announced the successful launch of its SwapClear futures commission merchant service in the US, allowing buy-side traders to centrally clear interest rate swaps.
The Stock Exchange of Thailand has drawn up a shortlist of vendors to supply a new trading engine that is expected boost capacity of the exchange by 100 times when implementation is completed in two years.
Eurex, the European derivatives exchange joint-owned by Deutsche Börse and SIX Swiss Exchange, has reported healthy volumes in its Korean KOSPI options contracts, with over 500,000 contracts traded since its launch on 30 August 2010.
The two-stage approach to adopting market integrity rules taken by national regulator the Australian Securities and Investment Commission, has been welcomed by agency broker and dark pool operator ITG, as it has opened the country to exchange competition while allowing further debate into more contentious issues.
Saxo Capital Markets, a trading platform provider and wholly-owned subsidiary of Denmark's Saxo Bank, has opened an office in Hong Kong in response to growing opportunities offered by increasing institutional flows to the region as well as demand for white-label solutions from financial institutions.
Plans by Canadian regulators to reduce high-frequency traffic have been welcomed by some equity market participants, while others fear higher costs would prompt a flight of low-latency trading volumes to the US.
European dark pools reached a record proportion of pan-European value traded in January 2011, with total dark pool activity estimated at between 3.5-4.5% of consolidated turnover.
Liquidnet, an agency broker and block-trading venue operator, has announced the appointment of Andrew Geissler to its equity capital markets team, to facilitate issuer access to institutional investors.
Finland's Evli Bank, an investment and wealth management bank, has introduced trading technology firm Tbricks' platform for dealing in Nordic cash and derivatives markets.
Traiana, a post-trade solutions supplier owned by interdealer broker ICAP, has extended its Harmony network's contract-for-difference equity swap service for use by long-only buy-side firms and hedge funds.