The Eurex Exchange Council has unanimously approved the planned introduction of a completely new trading architecture at its regular meeting. This approval meets a major legal requirement.

The introduction of the new trading system will, among other things, also require an amendment to the Exchange Rules to also be approved by the Exchange Council. The migration is scheduled to begin in December 2012, with products transferred from the current to the new system in four stages.

“The new trading system will give Eurex customers access to the latest technology. The change will ensure that the essential requirements of participants are met in terms of minimising latency, maximising data throughput, further increasing flexibility and providing a high level of reliability,” says Gustav Gass, Chairman of the Eurex Exchange Council. “Our approval sees the foundation stone laid for Eurex Exchange to continue to operate one of the industry's leading technical infrastructures.”

Since the system change was announced, Eurex has launched an extensive consultation process with its 430 participating firms and key software vendors. The chosen approach, which replaces the MISS infrastructure and VALUES API interface currently used by Eurex with standard interfaces based on FAST and FIXML, met with a positive reception. The planned new functions for strategy and spread trading also met with particular interest. A simulation environment is to be available to participants from the end of August.

The new Eurex system is being completely developed internally on the basis of Deutsche Börse Group’s own global trading architecture, which is already in use at the International Securities Exchange (ISE).