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Story URL: http://www.silicon.com/financialservices/0,3800010322,39273024,00.htm

Turquoise trading platform begins to settle
Upstart exchange goes live

By Julian Goldsmith

Published: Tuesday 19 August 2008

Investment-bank-owned share trading platform Turquoise, which went live last week, is expected to complete the first clearing and settlement of trades in the UK and Germany in the next two days.

The cash equity trading platform aims to offer cheaper trading for banks and brokerages than incumbent exchanges.

Cheat Sheets

♦ Basel II
♦ MiFID
♦ Sarbanes-Oxley

The platform was slated for launch after the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID) came into effect last November. However, the platform was forced to delay launch because it had difficulty in acquiring a suitable trading engine, according to reports.

At launch only five stocks are traded on the platform but Turquoise is expected to extend its services to 1,300 stocks across 13 European markets.

Volumes are also expected to be small until the platform completes clearing and settlement on initial trades.

Colt Telecom said it has connected 10 large banks and market data customers to the platform.