Deutsche Börse Group publishes its 2011 review : growth strategy pays off – strong position in technology, risk and collateral management further expanded

The year 2011 was defined especially by the uncertainties surrounding the European sovereign debt crisis and the associated volatility in the financial markets, says Deutsche Börse in its 2011 review. This led to greater hedging needs for market participants. In 2011, Deutsche Börse AG acted again as a guarantor of safety and stability for the financial markets, with a positive impact on the real economy. The Group will therefore continue its growth initiatives in the areas of risk management, clearing, sales and products in 2012.

The Eurex, ISE and Xetra exchanges operated by Deutsche Börse all increased their trading volumes in 2011 compared with the previous year. The volumes cleared and settled/held in custody by Eurex Clearing and Clearstream grew year-on-year by two and eleven percent, respectively. Market Data & Analytics also achieved considerable growth in its business activities of eight percent year on year. The growth in transactions and business would not have been possible without best in class IT infrastructure, in which Deutsche Börse has made significant investments over the past year.

Clearstream for efficience

Efficient management of the collateral that protects and thus enables financial transactions is absolutely essential if markets are to remain operative, particularly in times of massive loss of confidence. Clearstream offers solutions precisely for this. The Brazilian central securities depository Cetip has been using the Clearstream service in collateral management for its domestic market since July 2011. Thus far this has been a national model – national exposure is secured with national assets. This is to be expanded: Cetip clients, for example, could then use international assets to hedge against risk by accessing Clearstream’s collateral pool, the Global Liquidity Hub.

A second focus of activity has been on liquidity management. Eurex Repo, Eurex Clearing and Clearstream jointly offer GC Pooling, an integrated market consisting of trading, central clearing, collateral management and settlement for secured and anonymous funding. This innovative solution – combining electronic trading, mitigation of counterparty risks by Eurex Clearing and the efficient collateral management via Clearstream Banking AG, as well as the re-use possibility of received collateral for refinancing within the framework of ECB (via Bundesbank) – is used by more than 80 market participants. Thus, GC Pooling has developed into an important instrument in the inter-bank market. Since its launch in 2005, average outstanding volumes have grown by around 80 percent each year.