EUROCCP SET TO LAUNCH WITH 15 FIRMS AS CLEARING PARTICIPANTS

Posted August 13, 2008

LONDON – European Central Counterparty Limited (EuroCCP) plans to launch on August 15 with 15 firms approved as clearing participants, including the nine founding members of Turquoise, the pan-European trading platform scheduled to launch September 5.

“[These 15 firms] make up a significant portion of the equity trading community in Europe,” says Diana Chan, Chief Executive Officer of EuroCCP. “We are also continuing to work with a number of other firms as they complete the requirements for participation, and we expect to announce additional individual and general clearing participants in the coming weeks.”

The nine Turquoise founding firms are Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Citi, UBS, BNP Paribas and Société Générale. The other participants of EuroCCP are ABN Amro, Barclays Capital, Crédit Agricole Cheuvreux, Instinet, KAS Bank and Lehman Brothers.

EuroCCP expects to be clearing and settling trades in 1,300 equity issues across 13 European markets in seven different currencies. Ultimately, EuroCCP expects to provide clearing and settlement services in more than 20 separate markets in Europe. EuroCCP conducts extensive reviews of potential participant firms to ensure they can meet their settlement obligations, and participant firms must supply collateral to be used if their firm cannot fulfill settlement obligations.

“MiFID and the Code of Conduct have been successful in unleashing competitive market forces and providing pricing transparency,” says Chan. “Since the European authorities announced their intention to allow new entrants for trading and clearing securities, established markets and central counterparties have slashed their fee structures – and more can be expected. We are committed to leading the way by being the low-cost, pan-European clearing and settlement provider to multilateral trading facilities (MTFs) as well as exchanges, offering them unparalleled efficiency, capacity, safety and business resiliency.”