EXCHANGE NEWSWIRE, 25 June 2010
A joint House-Senate Committee approved a final version of the financial reform bill which allows banks to invest up to 3% of their capital in private equity and hedge funds and forces them to spinoff part of their prop desks (excluding IR swaps and FX which account for the bulk of trading). The bill also calls for “much” of OTC derivatives to move to regulated exchanges or cleared through a regulated clearinghouse, with bona-fide hedgers exempt from forced clearing. Clearinghouses will also be allowed to borrow emergency funds from the Fed. Large banks and hedge funds would charged certain fees to cover the $19 bn cost of the new regulations.
DB1: Eurex Clearing is working on a plan to give customers the option to have collateral held separately from clearing members, FIA Magazine reported.
DB1’s board member Frank Gertenschlaeger said “we do not think the European Markets Infrastructure Legislation should legally mandate CCP interoperability in cash equities. The rising number of CCP links is expected to create new systemic risks and additional costs for the market.”
NYX: NYSE Arca options will start trading weekly Short Term Option Series on June 25, available for AAPL, BAC, BP, C and XLF.
ASX announced that its new large order execution service, VolumeMatch, will be available from June 28. 23 participants received authorization to use the service. The exchange stated that VolumeMatch “is unlike anonymous execution services characterised as dark pools or books.”
Singapore Mercantile Exchange (SMX) appointed FFastFill to provide connectivity to the Exchange. SMX will go live on August 2010.
NZX raised some Annual Listing and Participant fees “to reflect inflation and higher costs … higher technology costs associated with running equity and debt markets, the much higher cost of providing frontline regulatory services, and the increased cost imposed by external regulator requirements.” Annual Listing fees on the Debt Market will increase 6.5% and on other markets will increase 17.75%, starting July 1.
NZX changed index rules by imposing a minimum of NZ0.25 six-month average closing price for the NZX50 index constituents . The rule will be effective from September 2011.
MCX received FCM approval to proceed with an IPO on condition that MCX sells a 10% stake to the government. MCX IPO also needs approval from the SEBI.
ICAP Brazil’s Director, Paulo Levy said they are looking to buy a brokerage firm in Brazil this year.
Financial Technologies will reduce its stake in National Spot Exchange of India from current 99% to 26% over time. The first 5-10% will be divested by year end.
United Stock Exchange of India will go live with FX futures trading in July. USE has 25 banks as promoters and 1200 participants.
GETCO launched Getco Execution Services in Europe, offering centralized clearing handled by LCH.Clearnet.
Discover Financial Services announced F2Q10 EPS of $0.33, beating consensus estimates of $0.11 as provisions for loan losses slowed down.
Julius Baer may be a bidder for Rabobank’s stake in Bank Sarasin according to Cash. Rabobank has a 46.1% of shareholding and 68.6% of voting rights in Bank Sarasin.
State Street appointed Executive VP, Nicholas Bonn, to head its Securities Finance Business.
Vanguard plans to launch 19 ETFs this year tracking US indexes, including an ETF for its $91.1 bn Vanguard 500 Index Fund (tracking the S&P 500 index). Expense ratios will range from 0.06% to 0.35%. Vanguard also introduced commission-free trading on its 46 ETFs, causing a 150% surge in trading and 90% growth in brokerage business during May.
IVZ: Russel Matthews, PM of the GBP12.4 bn Invesco Bond Fund, left the firm. He will be replaced by Mark Nash.
Malaysia’s Central Bank will allow foreign brokers to trade on wholesale interbank FX electronic broking platforms, starting July 1.
The Restoring American Financial Stability Act approved by a joint House-Senate Committee this morning banned the trading of financial derivatives based on box-office receipts. Media Derivatives had secured approval from the CFTC on June 15 to launch its first five contracts.
Provided By: Equity Research Desk, www.erdesk.com