Derivs - People and Markets

The Singapore Exchange is looking to refine how its central counterparty operates during a default. The exchange is proposing changes to improve the auction process for managing a default.

South Korea’s tax regime is disadvantaging local issuers of synthetic exchange-traded funds, as ETFs listed offshore and invested in by Korean investors are not subject to the country’s full range of taxation.

European trade repositories are calling for the European Securities and Markets Authority to set down guidelines on global legal entity identifiers, or LEIs, ahead of trade repository reporting going live in February.

There are three main components to the European Market Infrastructure Regulation: risk management requirements for OTC derivatives that are not centrally cleared; central clearing of certain OTC derivatives, together with a harmonized framework of clearing within Europe; and reporting of all derivatives to trade repositories.

The communiqué from China’s Third Plenum of the 18th Party Congress lacks clarity on market reforms, despite the meeting openly committing the country to a market driven economy, according to market officials.

Dealers in the interbank market in mainland China are actively pricing interest rate swaps on the country’s new Loan Prime Rate, with a number of transactions already executed.

Mohamed Yangui, the ex-head of product development and structuring group at Nomura in London, is set to join Bank of America Merrill Lynch in a similar role in London.

Adam Welham, the ex-head of European equity syndicate at Barclays in London, is set to join U.S.-based Fidelity Investments as a managing director in equity capital markets.

More names are emerging of departures at Credit Suisse. On the rates side, Mathias Berenger, head of European vanilla options trading and Richard Ratcliffe, head of rates sales to the Netherlands, both in London, are exiting. Colleagues confirmed their departures. A spokesman declined to comment.

The Singapore Exchange is looking to refine how its central counterparty operates during a default and is proposing changes to improve the auction process for managing a defaulting over-the-counter derivative contract.

Regulatory burdens such as authorization for central counterparty clearinghouses are likely to hinder the launch of new products in Europe, noted Trevor Spanner, ceo of LME Clear, speaking at the 29th Annual Futures & Options Expo in Chicago.

U.S. equity option exchanges are considering a raft of action plans for securities information processors, such as looking at backups in the event of a technological failure.