Stockholm, December 18, 2012 — NASDAQ OMX Nordic today announced the clearing of SEK denominated interest rate swaps for end client trades in the Nordic market in February 2013. This will provide the entire market with a clearing solution for standardized SEK denominated interest rate swaps. Since November 2011 clearing has been available for the trades between participating members only, while NASDAQ OMX and the Nordic member community have negotiated the legal and technical framework for a successful introduction of interest rate swaps clearing for end client trades.
“We’re confident that cleared interest rate swaps will be a strong addition to our current product suite of cleared interest rate derivatives on the Nordic market,” Jens Henriksson, Head of Nordic Fixed income, NASDAQ OMX, commented. “We currently have an average daily clearing volume in excess of USD 20 billion. The first stage to expand the product scope includes interest rate swaps, forward rate agreements and overnight index swaps denominated in SEK. The next phase is to provide the market with clearing of interest rate swaps and related derivatives denominated in DKK, NOK and EUR.”
Rules and regulations as well as the technical system were upgraded on November 26th in order to facilitate the introduction of new instruments.
In order to provide a secure clearing service, NASDAQ OMX and participating clearing members have agreed to perform an extensive exercise where a default situation is simulated, during January. Participation in regular exercises are part of the agreement that members need to enter with NASDAQ OMX before participating in and later potentially offer clearing services for clearing of interest rate swaps.
The following members have agreed to participate in the default exercise:
- Swedbank
- SEB
- Handelsbanken
- Nykredit
- Nordea
- Danske Bank
- Swedish National Debt Office
A majority of the participating members have entered a number of trades for clearing at NASDAQ OMX Clearing in Stockholm during 2012 in order to verify the system and the operational work-flow. NASDAQ OMX has also integrated with MarkitWire during 2012 in order to support the existing infrastructure for the OTC market.
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About NASDAQ OMX
The inventor and transformer of the electronic exchange, The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc., fuels economies with revolutionary technologies for the entire lifecycle of a trade - from risk management to trade to surveillance to clearing. In the US and Europe, we own and operate 23 markets, 3 clearinghouses and 6 central securities depositories supporting equities, options, fixed income, derivatives, commodities, futures and structured products. Able to process more than 1 million messages per second at sub-80 microsecond speeds with 99.999% uptime, our technology drives more than 70 exchanges in 50 developed and emerging countries into the future, powering 1 in 10 of the world’s securities transactions. Our award-winning data products and worldwide indexes are the benchmarks in the financial industry. Home to 3,400 listed companies worth $5.1 trillion in market cap whose innovations shape our world, we give the ideas of tomorrow access to capital today. Welcome to where the world takes a big leap forward, daily. Welcome to the NASDAQ OMX Century. NASDAQ OMX Nordic and NASDAQ OMX Baltic are not legal entities but describe the common offering from NASDAQ OMX exchanges in Helsinki, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Iceland, Tallinn, Riga, and Vilnius.
To learn more, visit www.nasdaqomx.com. Follow us on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/NASDAQ) and Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/nasdaqomx). (Symbol: NDAQ and member of S&P 500)
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
The matters described herein contain forward-looking statements that are made under the Safe Harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements include, but are not limited to, statements about NASDAQ OMX's products and offerings. We caution that these statements are not guarantees of future performance. Actual results may differ materially from those expressed or implied in the forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve a number of risks, uncertainties or other factors beyond NASDAQ OMX's control. These factors include, but are not limited to factors detailed in NASDAQ OMX's annual report on Form 10-K, and periodic reports filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. We undertake no obligation to release any revisions to any forward-looking statements.
Media contact:
Martin Hedensiö
+46 8 405 62 54
martin.hedensio@nasdaqomx.com
