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Investors were buying puts and put spreads on real estate investment trusts ahead of the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee announcement on Wednesday (March 18), as such sectors are sensitive to interest rates so are prime targets for options hedging.

The decision to add 25 constituents to the iTraxx Crossover in September was a mistake, as it hasn’t increased the trading volume of single name credit default swaps as expected, according to market makers.

Moscow Exchange is now trading futures contracts on the onshore Chinese renminbi against the Russian rouble after a substantial increase in renminbi turnover on the exchange and growing volume of settlement in the currency between Russia and China, in addition to new demand for hedging of such transactions.

The rapid slide in the euro against the dollar has made buying shortdated puts an increasingly popular but expensive trade. As a result, investors are seeking to capitalise on further euro downside with more exotic trades on the back of higher volatilities.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has fined ICE Futures $3m in penalty liabilities for failure to accurately submit trade reporting data as mandated under the Dodd-Frank Act for designated contract markets.

Clearing houses are being forced to re-evaluate margin requirements and costs thanks to persistent incongruences in national jurisdiction rules for central counterparties.

Default fund contributions by central counterparties, known as skin in the game, are not the only risk management mechanisms for clearing house operations and resolution systems, and they do not compensate for other risk mitigation strategies, said market officials.

This week, the Futures Industry Association held its 40th Annual Boca conference in Boca Raton, Florida where senior buysiders, sellsiders, exchanges, clearing houses, lawyers and other market officials met to dicuss the trading and regulatory landscape in the derivatives markets. The GlobalCapital team reported from the event, covering all the hot topics such as regional fragmentation, central counterparty equivalence, cross-border regulation, trading and execution requirements, and more.

Swaps regulation needs to be overhauled in the US in order to stop trading flow moving away from trading centres in New York and elsewhere in the US to overseas markets, according to Christopher Giancarlo, Commissioner at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. GlobalCapital was granted an exclusive interview with Commissioner Giancarlo, to discuss how these flows can be reversed via regulatory harmonisation and global co-operation.

The derivatives markets have undergone the biggest regulatory overhaul in history since the global financial crisis. But buysiders are failing to see any benefits to their trading operations apart from increased costs, according to speakers at the 40th Annual Futures Industry Association Boca Conference in Boca Raton, Florida.

Competing markets and jurisdictions between China and Hong Kong pose regulatory uncertainty and liabilities as derivatives market participants transact on the Hong Kong-Shanghai Stock Connect, according to panellists at the Futures Industry Expo Conference in Boca Raton, Florida.

If more banks are forced out of the clearing business as a result of the stringent leverage ratio rules under Basel III, then the remaining futures commissions merchants will not have the capacity to take on their clients, according to speakers at the 40th Annual Futures Industry Association Boca Conference in Boca on Tuesday.