Deutsche Börse Developing European Bond Index Family

Deutsche Börse AG is launching a new family of European bond indices in September. The index family for bonds, like the STOXX indices for equities, will be calculated for countries from the European area (without Greece and Norway) as well as the euro zone (without Luxembourg). The new bond indices will be designated to serve as a benchmark to track the performance of fixed-income securities on a pan-European level. For private investors, they offer a new basis for investments in bond funds and index warrants, and in professional trading they will serve as an underlying instrument for derivatives products. "Indices are an important yardstick for the measurement of market trends. The new bond index family will expand our current range of information products and services," said Christoph Lammersdorf, the Executive Board member responsible for the Information Products division of Deutsche Börse. An aggregate index and maturity indices from one to 10 years will be calculated for every segment, i.e. euro zone and pan-European area, and for every country represented in these segments. Additional indices for 15, 20 and 30-year maturities will be calculated for the aggregate euro-zone and European -area indices. The indices will be calculated as both price and performance indices. Moreover, in view of the special needs of investment funds, Deutsche Börse has decided to design the new product group as synthetic indices and basket indices. In the case of synthetic indices, the maturity is constant; in the case of basket indices the maturity fluctuates along with the maturities of the bonds contained in the index. The basis of the index family is December 30, 1998 with a value of 100.