New for Traders: Week ending Nov. 23

Regulation

• The U.S. Treasury Department exempted forex swaps and forwards from Dodd-Frank regulations that will apply to other derivatives. The agency explained the decision by saying that “unlike other derivatives, FX swaps and forwards already trade in a highly-transparent, liquid and efficient market.”
• The U.S. Federal Trade Commission approved CME’s bid to acquire the Kansas City Board of Trade for $126 million in cash.
• The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will not postpone new transparency rules requiring gas, oil and mining companies to disclose payments made to foreign governments for extraction rights.
• The National Futures Association (NFA) launched an updated version of its Background Affiliation Status Information Center (BASIC), which provides additional financial information on futures commission merchants.

Commodities

• The European Energy Exchange (EEX) will launch trading in spot contracts for United Nations carbon offsets beginning on Dec. 5.
• Altegris Clearing solutions announced the creation of the Altegris CTA Challenge, a year-long competition that will recognize the industry’s best commodity trading advisors. All qualified CTAs are eligible. Registration closes on Dec. 10, and the winner will be announced in early 2014.
• CME Group will pay a total of $2 million to almost 200 Peregrine Financial Group (PFG) clients who traded on CME exchanges. The cash comes from a CME fund established earlier this year to protect farmers, ranchers and agricultural coops that use the company’s market to hedge their products.
• Phillip Futures DMCC, an online trading services provider, has been approved as a broker clearing member of the Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange (DGCX). The company offers clients a variety of financial services, such as stock-broking, share financing, asset management and investment research.

Technology

• Equinix partnered with Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Co. to deliver data center and interconnection services to Middle East customers by establishing a carrier-neutral hub in the region. As part of the offering, Equinix has acquired a data center facility in Dubai, which will be open by Jan. 1, 2013.
• NYSE Technologies launched NYSE Liffe Market Data Web Services, designed to allow investors to access market data content over the internet and on-demand from remote locations.
• NASDAQ will launch NASDAQ OMX Datacenter Extended (NODE) across Europe to give customers access from the exchange’s current Points of Presence in London and Frankfurt to its equity, fixed income, commodity markets and colocation space in Stockholm, Sweden.

Options

• Intercontinental Exchange Inc. licensed Markit’s North American and European corporate credit default swap indexes, with the aim of developing futures and options contracts based on Markit’s CDX and iTraxx index families.
• The Options Industry Council (OIC) and the Shanghai Association for International Exchange of Personnel signed a memorandum of understanding to strengthen cooperation on options research and education.
• FinancialsCME Group Inc. increased the credit line to its credithouse by two-thirds, to a total of $5 billion, in advance of new regulations that will transfer trades in interest rate swaps and credit default swaps from over-the-counter venues to regulated clearinghouses.
• Shareholders approved a proposed $1.6 billion merger between Osaka Securities Exchange Co. (OSE) and Tokyo Stock Exchange Group Inc. (TSE). TSE bought 66.7% of OSE after a tender offer that ended in August.
• Moscow Exchange and Deutsche Börse signed a Letter of Intent agreeing to cooperate on exchange infrastructure, product development and IT, and on regulations governing trading, clearing, settlement and custody, collateral management and market data.
• The Spanish Stock Exchangeannounced the launch of its 70thexchange-traded fund. The ETF, issued by Lyxor, is called the Lyxor ETF Euro Stoxx50 Daily Short and will begin trading on Nov. 21.
• ForexBloomberg introduced a new feature allowing clients to trade foreign exchange options using the company’s multi-bank trading platform, FXGO. With the request-for-quote system, users can request and consolidate pricing for any currency option simultaneously.
• CME Group is expected to offer 30 forex futures products, including currency pairs involving the USD, EUR and CNY when it launches its European bourse next year.