Diana Chan, the slated chief executive of EuroCCP, the merger of two pan-European cash equities clearing houses, said her priority next year will be to gain access to national exchanges.

EMCF and EuroCCP said in a statement on December 6 that their combination to from Europe’s largest cash equities central counterparty is complete.

Chan, who will be chief executive of the combined company, joined EuroCCP in 2007 from Citi where she had been head of market strategy and market policy in securities and fund services. She told Markets Media that the merger that will combine the best from both clearers to form a new business that is stronger than its predecessors and more financially robust.

“Clients will not have to pay two separate settlement charges for a stock so settlement fees will be reduced by 50%,” Chan said. “Clearing fees have been reduced by between 80% and 90% in the last six years as a result of competition, and so settlement fees are the next frontier of cost reduction.”

EuroCCP, the European subsidiary of the US Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation, went live in August 2008 clearing for Turquoise, the European MTF owned by the London Stock Exchange, in 14 European equity markets.

In 2011 LCH.Clearnet and SIX x-clear received regulatory approval for interoperability, or open access to clearing, which reduces customers’ collateral requirements through netting margins across multiple venues. In that year exchange Bats Europe gave access to its trade feed to EuroCCP, LCH.Clearnet and SIX x-clear, giving clients a choice of clearer and Turquoise opened its trade feed to CC&G, LCH. Clearnet and SIX x-clear.

“My vision for the new company is that it will provide an attractive alternative for clearing, deliver sustainable competition and enable customers to have a true choice,” added Chan.

Starting in January all EuroCCP customers will be migrated to the Dutch platform.

“In the first quarter my focus will be on the customer migration,” Chan said. “After that we need to unblock access to trades trade feeds from national stock exchanges which will bring further significant savings to customers.”

She said the joint firm has more than 60 clearing members and she expects to attract more trading firms if equity markets continue to rise.

“In a year’s time I would expect to have more trading firms using the new company and to have increased trading volumes,” Chan added.

EMCF and EuroCCP said they intended to merge in March this year and the deal was given unconditional clearance given by the UK’s Office of Fair Trading in October.

The completion this month follows the approval of Dutch Central Bank to allow The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation and Bats Chi-X Europe to become shareholders in EMCF.

EMCF will change its name to European Central Counterparty N.V on 6 January 2014. It was  previously owned by ABN Amro Clearing Bank and Nasdaq OMX and and the combined entity will be owned by ABN Amro, Nasdaq OMX, DTCC and Bats Chi-X Europe.