Two weeks after announcing a trading and clearing alliance with the Natural Gas Exchange (NGX) of Calgary, Canada, IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) said it has acquired a series of natural gas indexes from publisher Intelligence Press (IPI).
Through a sale-leaseback arrangement, Atlanta-based ICE will rely on indexes that IPI will continue to aggregate and publish in its Natural Gas Intelligence (NGI) newsletters, while also gaining the exclusive right to license the indexes for exchange settlement and clearing.
ICE’s attention to clearing and settlement was evident in its trading and clearing alliance deal with NGX, a unit of Toronto Stock Exchange parent TSX Group. The arrangement centers on physical settlement of energy transactions, a forte of NGX and a gap that ICE is now able to fill in its own range of offerings in the North American market.
The NGI indexes, in addition to playing a role in daily and monthly spot price discovery, are used by ICE and others for daily and monthly settlement and clearing, particularly in the Midwest and California natural gas markets, according to ICE’s announcement.