EUROCCP COMPLETES END-TO-END DATA TESTING FOR TURQUOISE PLATFORM
Posted July 24, 2008
LONDON -- EuroCCP today announced the completion of the final phase of
end-to-end testing required for next month’s limited live testing of the
Turquoise pan-European trading platform.
The final phase involved passing data between EuroCCP and the Turquoise
platform, all trading parties, and the settlement agent, Citi Global
Transaction Services.
“We are very pleased to have passed this critical milestone, well in
advance of the actual soft launch of trading planned in mid-August,”
says Diana Chan, Chief Executive Officer of EuroCCP.
“Throughout the development of our clearing and settlement
platform, working closely with Citi, we have committed ourselves to
delivering a highly resilient and low cost solution for Turquoise.”
In August, Turquoise will start trading in a limited number of European
equities, and any firm that has been accredited with the platform and
EuroCCP will be able to execute transactions in those shares. More
equity issues will be phased in until all 1,500 securities are trading
by the full launch, scheduled for early September.
The nine members of the Turquoise consortium are involved in about 50
percent of the total equity trading in Europe, and other trading members
will add to the overall ability of Turquoise to generate liquidity for
the platform.
“Essentially, we have now completed a very inclusive and complex testing
process,” says Trevor Spanner, EuroCCP’s Chief Operating Officer.
“Trading firms have been involved in submitting scripted trades that are
executed on the Turquoise platform which are then forwarded to EuroCCP.
EuroCCP validates the trades, nets them down, sends settlement
instructions to Citi and the settlement agents selected by the
participants, and sends relevant reports to all parties.”
EuroCCP expects to have at least 20 clearing members by the end of 2008 plus an additional 40 or 50 trading members clearing and settling through those clearing members, according to Chan. A comparative analysis conducted by EuroCCP in June found the average cost for clearing paid by financial firms was 26 eurocents across the 14 markets covered by EuroCCP services, while EuroCCP’s anticipated average cost will be 2.9 eurocents per transaction. EuroCCP’s highest cost is 6 eurocents per transaction.