MTS, one of the leading European electronic fixed income platforms and data service providers and Trad-X, Tradition’s award-winning interest rate platform, have today launched a unique new MTS Tradition European Asset Swaps data service which will be made available through TraditionDATA, the data arm of Compagnie Financière Tradition (Tradition). The product benefits issuers of European debt, financial institutions such as insurers, investors and asset managers who want to manage their cash flow profiles and reduce interest rate risk.

This is the first product launch following the recently announced collaboration between the two companies. The new data service uniquely consolidates MTS’ French, German, Italian and Spanish live and executable interdealer government bond data with real-time executable EUR interest rate swap (IRS) data from Tradition’s Trad-X platform to produce the related Asset Swap.

As MTS has over 20 million price updates per day across its central limit order books, and Trad-X seeing over four million updates a day, this service will provide the most accurate set of inputs available to generate an indicative set of asset swaps prices.

The new MTS Tradition European Asset Swaps service is based on the fully executable dealer-to-dealer (D2D) prices from both MTS’ leading electronic fixed income trading market in Europe and Trad-X, Tradition’s market-leading joint venture with 13 of the world’s largest banks, in EUR, USD and GBP IRS. TraditionDATA will publish the resulting Yield/Yield and Par/Par asset swaps built from the two regulated real-time order books.

Multi and single country (French, German, Italian and Spanish) displays are available, alongside the most accurate set of indicative Yield/Yield and Par/Par asset swaps – calculated against both three- and six-month IRS maturities – with price points ranging from two years out to 30 years.

The data is available via TraditionDATA’s own direct feeds as well as through select vendors.

Scott Fitzpatrick, Global Head of TraditionDATA, says: “Finding value for our customers is a key driver of the forward-looking nature of the data business we are building here at Tradition. This collaboration with two flagship EU trading platforms in the form of MTS and Trad-X brings a valuable, logical and unique source of key data for many European customers. Data is no longer just a by-product of trading; innovative data feeds and information have become the cornerstone to efficient execution and trading strategies.”

Mohamed Braham, Global Head of Trading for Fixed Income and Currencies at Société Generale Corporate and Investment Banking, comments: “As a leader on European Rates Products we welcome this initiative from MTS and Trad-X. This innovative combination of executable prices across platforms will add transparency and be beneficial to our clients and to the market as a whole.”

BancoPosta Fondi SGR, an Italian investment management firm, added: “This collaboration between MTS and Trad-X is very welcome as it leverages their unique access to market data to create a new reference product for the market. Accurately shining transparency on European asset swap spreads for the first time will benefit a broad cross-section of the buy and sell-side in the pricing of new issues, benchmarking of positions and the hedging of interest rate risk.”

Fabrizio Testa, CEO at MTS Spa and EuroMTS Ltd, says: “With the introduction of this new data product, MTS aims to enhance the services it provides to its extensive network of Issuers and Primary Dealers in the Government bond and SSA space. Asset Swap levels are a critical reference for pricing new issues as well as evaluating bond performance once issued. At the same time, the Asset Swap product adds to an ever-expanding MTS data offering and will benefit portfolio management and risk evaluation activities of its participants and data clients.”

Source: MTS