Stockholmsbörsen And LCH.Clearnet Establish Clearing Cooperation

Today, Stockholmsbörsen established cooperation with the largest clearing house in Europe, LCH.Clearnet. This cooperation is a further step in the Exchange's efforts to strengthen the competitiveness and availability of the Nordic derivatives market.

In June 2003, Stockholmsbörsen and the London Stock Exchange established an international marketplace for equity derivatives, EDX London. As a result of the new cooperation between Stockholmsbörsen and LCH.Clearing, transactions in Scandinavian derivatives traded on EDX London will be cleared by LCH.Clearnet.

Stockholmsbörsen has already been cooperating with the Norwegian and Danish derivatives markets by operating links to those markets. The purpose of the link cooperation is to enable exchange members to trade in all Scandinavian derivative products on participating exchanges - the Oslo Exchange, the Copenhagen Exchange, EDX London and Stockholmsbörsen - based on a single membership. By enabling the exchanges to offer derivative products through a common trading system - CLICK- the clearing link makes it possible to have all trades registered in the same order book.

"The clearing link between Stockholmsbörsen and LCH.Clearnet is a further step in the efforts of the Exchange to provide its customers with greater efficiency and liquidity by improving access to the Swedish derivatives market through international cooperation," says Kerstin Hessius, President of Stockholmsbörsen.