The Mexican peso has completed a year as a CLS-eligible currency. During June 2009, the peak month to date, the average daily volume of instructions settled in Mexican pesos was 2,468 with a US dollar equivalent value of $15 billion, compared with 1,389 worth $17 billion in June 2008 – volume growth of more than 77%.

Although the bank is not commenting, it appears that Bank of America Merrill Lynch is making more changes to its FX business. The latest gossip is that it has hired Tom Gillie from Credit Suisse in Singapore, where he was head of FX options trading and structuring, Asia, for a senior role in options. The bank is also thought to have hired Chris Bae from Goldman Sachs in Asia, where he traded equity derivatives, for a role in FX.

Morgan Stanley has reported negative results for the past three quarters, but is still waving its chequebook around as it seeks to build up its trading businesses. First up is Jack DiMaio, who is joining the firm as its global head of interest rate, credit and currency trading. Further down the pecking order, the bank is believed to have lured Stuart Sopp from Citi Singapore to take up a senior spot-trading role in its Hong Kong office.

Jack Jeffery has left options specialist SuperDerivatives, where he was chief operating officer. Press reports have linked him with various jobs elsewhere – including bond platform MTS – although sources close to Jeffery say he has not decided anything yet. His departure is believed to have been extremely amicable and the same sources say that SuperDerivatives has asked him to retain a seat on its board.

Kai ‘Lucky’ Herbert, who left Bank of America in January 2008 to join Merrill Lynch, has decided to seek his fortune elsewhere. He is off to Zurich to trade emerging market currencies for UBS.

Corporate losses on foreign-currency hedging deals are resolvable but the road to agreement is difficult.

The build-up at CIBC continues. The bank has hired Chris Dunning as its global head of FX options and Eric Ohayon as a managing director, FX and commodity structuring. Dunning, who joins from UniCredit, will be located in Toronto and reports to Tim Carrington, the bank’s global head of FX options. Ohayon, who was at Bank of America, will also be based in Toronto and reports to Bill Bamber, CIBC’s global head, structuring. CIBC has also hired in sales. Natasha Crago joins from Baring Asset Management as a director, reporting to Barnie Hartley, and Ross Hefford, who is an exile from ABN Amro/RBS joins as an executive director, reporting to his former colleague Mark Sweeting.

This is the last column I will write until September – I’m off to France for a well-earned break. But don’t despair – I have lined up four market participants who know what they’re talking about to stimulate the grey matter of those readers still chained to their desks. I may also be tempted to break my holiday if any major news comes in during August – there is plenty of stuff brewing.

The relatively high levels of volatility may be one reason why volumes have plummeted, even if a more convincing argument for option use can easily be made

FXall has announced that Kas Bank, the European specialist in wholesale securities services, has joined FXall as a new liquidity provider. “The addition of Kas Bank to the growing number of European liquidity providers on FXall is significant for our clients,” says Phil Weisberg, FXall’s chief executive. “As one of the leading banks for institutional investors in Europe, Kas Bank’s client base is a natural fit with our existing customers and we look forward to furthering our joint relationship.”

It may not have won this year’s Tour de France, but it must have been smiles all around at Saxo Bank last Sunday. It’s young superstar, Andy Schleck, finished in second place, while his older brother Fränk was not too far behind him in fifth. Only the unbelievably good Spanish rider Alberto Contador – all five feet of him – could defeat the younger Schleck.

Barclays Capital has hired Ivan Ferraroni as head of FX bank sales, Asia Pacific. He will be based in Singapore and report to Lutfey Siddiqi, head of FX distribution and corporate FX, Asia Pacific. Previously, Ferraroni was head of FX sales and trading at Royal Bank of Scotland Tokyo.

It’s clear that you can’t build a decent house without good plumbing, so the CME’s hire of Andrew Lamb as its chief executive for CME Clearing Europe looks solid. The appointment is subject to the approval of the CME’s application to the UK’s Financial Services Authority to become a recognised clearing house (RCH).

After what insiders admit has been a tough period, Citi’s plans to aggressively expand its options business now look to be back on track. The bank has carried out a thorough overhaul of its pricing and risk systems and is apparently having an extremely good year. It has also just hired Dominc Yip as a senior vanilla trader from Dresdner Kleinwort, as well as Roland Jeurissen for its correlation team.

This column – indeed Euromoney as a whole – has always promoted FX as a key asset, but that doesn’t mean we shy away from the issues that portray the industry in a poor light.

It’s been so quiet – I reckon one quarter of the European FX market is down at its chalet in Verbier for the Tour de France and another quarter was doing L’Etape du Tour this week – it was good to see a bit of action in the English pound/Scottish pound market. Normally this inactive cross trades at 1.00/1.05 – Scottish notes are always discounted because they are hard to use south of the border – but the offer moved out after the University of Glasgow published an analysis of Scotland’s GDP. What a shocker it was.

I received details of a charity concert being performed at Leadenhall Market in the City of London next week. The show will be performed by a band called Client Number 9 – whose members all work in the Lloyd’s insurance market – in aid of the The Mark Evison Foundation and Welsh Guards Afghanistan Fund (see http://www.clientnumber9.co.uk/index.htm).

It’s been a mixed week for Saxo. It looked like the bank’s cycling team would not win this year’s Tour de France after one of its most popular riders, Jens Voight, had a horrific crash on Tuesday. On the plus side, Jens isn’t seriously injured and the team bounced back to rip apart Wednesday’s stage to Le Grand Bornand. Fränk Schleck took the stage victory and his younger brother Andy moved into second overall on the general classification, so he’s still in with a chance of victory.

Inter-dealer broker Icap says that activity is picking up in its non-deliverable forwards business on its EBS platform. “We have seen a steady increase in global counterparty participation, particularly over the last few months. Over 135 banks, evenly dispersed among our three major trading centres in Asia-Pacific, London and New York, are now live to trade NDFs on the platform,” says Chris Soriano, NDFs product manager at Icap electronic broking.

Jack Jeffery has left options specialist SuperDerivatives, where he was chief operating officer. Press reports have linked him with various jobs elsewhere – including bond platform MTS – although sources close to Jeffery say he has not decided anything yet. His departure is believed to have been extremely amicable and the same sources say that the company has asked him to retain a seat on its board.

As reported here back in March, Standard Chartered Bank has appointed Adrian Walkling as its global head of financial institutions sales. He will be based in Singapore and report to David Carr, global head of sales. Walkling joins StanChart from UBS, where he was co-head of fixed income, currencies and commodities for Europe, Middle East and Africa.

Trading platform provider Caplin Systems has appointed Mike Hill to the newly created role of director of marketing. Hill will report directly to Paul Caplin, the company’s chief executive.

It may well have lost loads of dosh for the past three quarters, but Morgan Stanley is still waving its cheque book around as it seeks to build up its trading businesses. First up is Jack DiMaio, who is joining the firm as its global head of interest rate, credit and currency trading. Further down the pecking order, the bank is believed to have lured Stuart Sopp from Citi Singapore to take up a senior spot-trading role in its Hong Kong office.

Morgan Stanley splashes the cash...

Conor Ogle, who joined ABN Amro in 1996, has joined HSBC as a business manager. He reports to Joe Norena, the bank’s new global head of FX business management and development (reported here first, People moves: HSBC hires FX ‘COO’ ).

Buzz in the market is that Bank of America/Merrill Lynch is continuing to hire for its FX option team. It is meant to have lured Chris Bae from Goldman Sachs in Asia, where he traded equity derivatives. Which hardly makes him a face in FX, but banks work in mysterious ways. There’s no comment from BofA/Merrill, possibly because it has yet to inform its existing team. I asked Goldman, but they said: “No comment”. But then I wasn’t likely to get a much of a response when there’s apparently been an outbreak of swine flu at the behemoth of Fleet Street.

Talk of an exit strategy seems premature when the whole process of rebalancing, led as it is by China resurgence, will take so long, and the US fundamentals out right.

The Royal Bank of Scotland has hired two senior salespeople for its Americas FX operations. Dennis Holman joins as a managing director in FX sales, reporting to Craig Donaldson, head of financial institutions FX and prime brokerage sales for North America. Chad Smith will join the firm as managing director, also in FX Sales, reporting jointly to Stefano Lupi, global head of FX bank sales and Craig Donaldson. Both will be based in RBS’ Americas headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut.

Online FX provider Alpari says it will launch two advanced trading platforms, Alpari Direct Pro and Alpari Direct, by the end of August. Both are white-labelled from Currenex and Alpari says they will feature STP, non-dealing desk execution, and one-click executable streaming prices, fractional pips and integrated algorithmic models that enable enhanced levels of execution. The platforms will also have an integrated Dow Jones news feed.

The CME has launched clearing services for over the counter (OTC) London gold forwards. The service will be available through CME ClearPort. The exchange says clearing services for house business – in other words own principal trading – will commence on August 23, while agency business (broking) should follow within 90 days. The contracts will be made available for clearing on COMEX through CME ClearPort, and are subject to COMEX and CME rules and regulations.