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The Sydney Futures Exchange Limited (SFE), a subsidiary of Australian Stock Exchange Limited (ASX), and eCOPS, LLC, a subsidiary of the New York Board of Trade® (NYBOT®), announced today that they have agreed to explore the use of eCOPS® for the issuance, safe keeping and transfer of electronic documents of title for Australian commodities. The proposed initiative is designed to support the lending and risk management products of several banks and agribusiness companies, and the delivery of commodities that are the subject of futures and options contracts listed and traded on the SFE and the ASX.
eCOPS is an electronic document management platform that tracks the movement of commodities in commerce and provides for the transfer of title of goods through the creation of negotiable documents of title and other electronic documents. Most commodity industries have logistically complex and far-reaching supply chains that require significant numbers of manually processed document presentations. eCOPS provides Electronic Warehouse Receipts (EWRs), title transfers, delivery orders, sampling orders, weight notes, invoices and insurance declarations. Other electronic documentation capabilities including a bill of lading are being developed.
eCOPS currently provides extensive electronic documentation and title transfers for coffee (symbol KC), cocoa (symbol CC) and Frozen Concentrate Orange Juice (symbol OJ) deliveries. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) designated eCOPS, LLC, as the first official provider of EWRs for coffee in 2003.
An Electronic Warehouse Receipt ("EWR") is a negotiable document evidencing title for the goods stored in a storage facility. The EWR is the core document of eCOPS and most of the other documents included in the system revolve around it. The information contained on each EWR is simple and not unlike its paper counterpart, including a warehouse facility's location, terms and conditions, etc.
The ASX group of companies (“ASX”) operates Australia’s major financial markets for equities and derivatives, providing listing, trading, risk management, clearing, settlement, depository and market data for domestic and global customers. The group represents the combined operations of Australian Stock Exchange and SFE Corporation which merged in July 2006 to create one of the world’s top-10 listed exchanges, with a capitalisation around A$5.9 billion.
The group’s equities market is capitalised at A$1.2 trillion, trading an average 120,000 equities transactions while its derivatives market trades over 400,000 futures and options transactions daily. Its central counterparties novate A$4 billion in traded equities value, and $100 billion in nominal futures and options value, daily. The group’s depository holds almost $700 billion in money market instruments and fixed income securities.
The New York Board of Trade (NYBOT) is New York’s original futures exchange, where the world trades food, fiber and financial products. For well over a century, the New York Board of Trade has provided reliability, integrity and security in a global marketplace for cocoa, coffee, cotton, ethanol, orange juice, wood pulp and sugar, as well as currency and index futures and options. Information about the New York Board of Trade can be found at www.nybot.com and www.nybotlive.com. To learn more about New York Board of Trade Futures & Options for Kids, the Exchange’s non-profit group, please go to www.futuresandoptionsforkids.org.
