Deutsche Börse Launches European Bond Indices BOX and EBOX New benchmark for bond trading

The new European BOX bond indices announced by the company on June 1 will be launched on September 27. The 728 indices in total track the performance of federal bonds and will be calculated for the EURO zone and the EU area. The indices for the EURO zone are called EBOX, the indices for the EU area, BOX. "The new indices supplement the bond indices we already have and create a benchmark for bond trading and for investment companies," said Christoph Lammersdorf, the Deutsche Börse Executive Board member responsible for the Information Products Division. The BOX indices are calculated for countries from the EU area (including Switzerland, but without Greece), and the EBOX indices for the countries in the EURO zone (without Luxembourg). According to Deutsche Börse, the new indices, which supplement the existing bond indices, will create a single index design for the European bond market. An overall index and several maturity subindices are calculated for each of the 10 countries in the EURO zone and the 14 countries in the EU area. The maturity indices comprise the maturities from one to 10 years, 15 years, 20 and 30 years. All of the indices are set up as price and performance indices, and also as basket indices and synthetic indices. In the case of the basket indices, the maturity fluctuates with the maturities of the bonds contained in the index. In contrast to basket indices, the maturity remains constant in the case of synthetic indices. The BOX index family is calculated back to January 1, 1993. The basis for the new product group is December 30, 1998 with a value of 100.