Reuters And The TSE Reach Agreement On Distribution Rights For Desktop Trading Workstation

The Toronto Stock Exchange and Reuters announced today that they have reached an agreement whereby Reuters has reacquired the Canadian distribution rights for the desktop trading workstation software developed by Reuters as part of the TSE's TOREX programme. This agreement does not include TOREX v1.2 which will continue to be licensed by the TSE until it is phased out in 2000. As previously announced the TSE has determined that the trading station business does not support its strategic direction. The TSE will continue to focus on providing the best, most cost-effective trading, listing and market data services possible. Terms were not disclosed. The fully automated Toronto Stock Exchange consistently ranks as one of the world's top exchanges and is Canada's premier market for senior equities, accounting for approximately 90% of all equity trading in Canada. In 1998, more than 26 billion shares traded, worth more than $490 billion - about $2 billion a day in share transactions. With a proud 147-year history at the heart of the Canadian economy, the TSE continues to provide Canadian and international investors with a well-regulated, fair and accessible marketplace. Reuters (NASDAQ: RTRSY) supplies the global financial markets and the news media with the widest range of information and news products including real-time financial data, collective investments data, numerical, textual, historical, and graphical databases plus news, graphics, news video, and news pictures, reaching over 519,000 users in 57,700 locations. Reuters designs and installs enterprise-wide information management and risk management systems for the financial markets as well as providing equity and foreign exchange transaction systems. It extensively uses Internet technologies for wider distribution of information and news. The Group employed 16,898 staff in 212 cities in 95 countries as of June 30, 1999. Reuters is the world's largest news and television agency with 1,946 journalists, photographers and camera operators in 183 bureaux serving 157 countries. News is published in 22 languages. For more details, see www.reuters.com/aboutreuters.