CLS, a market infrastructure group delivering settlement, processing and data solutions, and IHS Markit, a world leader in critical information, analytics and solutions, today announced that Goldman Sachs has joined its cross-currency swaps settlement service. There are now eight settlement members live on the service, including some of the largest global banks.

This demonstrates the benefits we can deliver to our clients by leveraging our unique position as a financial market infrastructure and collaborating with established service providers that share the same client base, such as IHS Markit. https://t.co/bmvNVgF8Eg#fx #fxtrading pic.twitter.com/fiPYueunVF

— CLS (@CLSGroup) June 11, 2020

The service is an extension of CLS’s unique payment-versus-payment (PvP) settlement service and uses the MarkitSERV trade confirmation platform to allow CLSSettlement members to send their cross-currency swaps into CLSSettlement for settlement. The cross-currency swap flows are multilaterally netted against all other FX transactions in CLSSettlement, resulting in a significant reduction in daily funding requirements for clients and considerable liquidity optimization benefits across the industry.

Richard Chambers, global head of Short Macro Trading at Goldman Sachs comments: “Becoming a participant of the cross-currency swap service provided by CLS and IHS Markit helps us to further mitigate settlement risk, and we expect to see further operational and funding efficiency benefits as more counterparties join the service.”

Keith Tippell, Head of Product, CLS: “We are delighted to welcome Goldman Sachs as the latest participant in our cross-currency swaps settlement service. Demand has never been higher from market participants for risk mitigation, liquidity optimization and post-trade efficiency. Further, this demonstrates the benefits we can deliver to our clients by leveraging our unique position as a financial market infrastructure in the FX marketplace and collaborating with established service providers that share the same client base, such as IHS Markit.

Chris Jackson, Managing Director, IHS Markit said: “Our collaboration with CLS is a powerful example of service providers working together to make the swaps market more efficient. As the community of global financial institutions connected by the MarkitSERV network continues to grow, the addition of Goldman Sachs to the cross-currency swaps settlement service demonstrates the industry’s ongoing support for such initiatives.”

Source: CLS