MTS Finland, the segment for the trading of Finnish government securities, was launched today, in cooperation with MTS Belgium. The segment, which is tailored to the needs of the Finnish market, will take advantage of the liquidity and efficiency of the MTS system through the technical and operational structure of MTS Belgium.
The establishment of MTS Finland is a result of the mutually beneficial arrangement between the respective Debt Agencies and Primary Dealers of Finland and Belgium. This partnership permits Finland to benefit from the use of the electronic trading platform of MTS Belgium whilst allowing MTS Finland to be governed independently by a market committee composed of Finnish Primary Dealers and the Finnish State Treasury. This thereby saves MTS Finland the task, and costs involved, of setting up a separate legal entity.
Furthermore, the Belgian and Finnish markets have put in place a reciprocal access agreement facilitating access at attractive economic conditions.
Satu Huber, Director of Finance, State Treasury of the Republic of Finland, said: “We are pleased with the launch of MTS Finland and our partnership with MTS Belgium. Not only does this provide us with an efficient national platform to trade the whole curve of our government’s fixed income securities, it aligns us with a proven and successful domestic MTS market on whose expertise we can count on.”
Baudouin Richard, Head of Financial Markets, Belgian Debt Agency said: “The partnership between MTS Finland and MTS Belgium is probably the most concrete illustration since the launch of the euro of a close cooperation between two government securities markets in the Euro zone. It is no coincidence that this cooperation takes place in the framework of the MTS electronic trading platform. MTS corporate governance and constructive support have been quite conducive to this development.”
MTS Belgium has now adopted the name MTS Associated Markets (MTSAM) to reflect the enlargement of the activity of the company to include the trading of Finnish government bonds, in addition to Belgian OLOs and Treasury Certificates. However, the name ‘MTS Belgium’ will continue to be used to refer to the activity of the company in the Belgian government securities market; likewise the name ‘MTS Finland’ will be used to refer to the activity of the company in the Finnish government securities market. Clearing and settlement for Finnish bonds will be done through Euroclear and Clearstream.
Since the launch of MTS Belgium in May 2000, the platform has enjoyed continued success with buoyant trading volumes and a sustained growth in the number of its participants. A record daily level of €2.127 billion was reached on the platform on September 24, 2001