August 2007

The coming revolution in fixed income e-trading

After many years during which change was merely incremental, electronic trading in debt markets is about to be fundamentally transformed. New entrants and platforms have emerged or are mooted, and fresh partnerships are being considered as incumbents find their value proposition under pressure. Dealers and clients will face a completely new way of debt trading. By Alex Chambers.


Buy side expect e-trading volume to rise
 
Interest rate swaps and CDS under-represented in e-trading
 
Depth of liquidity matters for the sell side
Source: SIFMA
THE WORLD’S SECURITIES exchanges, which are all trading on historically high P/E ratios, are eyeing fixed-income markets for growth opportunities. Inter-dealer brokers are creating new strategies including mergers and acquisitions, and the various data vendors/platforms are seeking to expand their product ranges. It has been several years since electronic trading was last in such a state of flux.

The emergence of LiquidityHub provides the clearest example of how the electronic trading landscape in various debt asset classes is set for a revolution. The LiquidityHub dealer consortium will finally drag European interest rate swaps trading into the electronic age.

But other mainstream sectors, such as US swaps, US treasuries and euro sovereign bonds, are lined up for an imminent makeover in...


The rest of this article is available to subscribers only

Please Subscribe or take a Free Trial below.
Already a subscriber? Log in here.