The Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) announced today that the second round of testing for the Options Symbology Initiative (OSI) concluded successfully and the industry is on track with preparations for next year’s changes.
Two more rounds of mandated Scripted Industry Testing (SIT) are scheduled for December and January prior to the February 12, 2010 final conversion date when the industry must be OSI compliant.
While the first two rounds of testing simulated the February 12, 2010 switch to the new OSI key, the November 14, 2009 SIT simulated the consolidation process that will take place between March and May of 2010. Participants in the second round of testing included 73 clearing members, seven exchanges, four service bureaus, OPRA and several price vendors. The number of clearing members that participated in the test represent approximately 91% of the year to date cleared options volume. Additionally, over 12,700 trades were processed by the exchanges and sent to OCC as matched trades.
After the beta and first round of mandatory testing, it was determined that some of the scripting needed to be revised to successfully execute the remaining tests. As a result, during November’s test, clearing members executed trades in the post consolidated classes, exchanges passed those matched trades to OCC and OCC was able to pass OSI compliant and consolidated data back to clearing members in a smooth fashion. The testing continues to be going well as indicated by the positive feedback and input from participants throughout all phases of the initiative.
