在20世纪90年代末跨境交易起飞，抓住了欧洲证券行业的不拉。到2000年，当阿姆斯特丹，布鲁塞尔和巴黎Bourses合并以形成大陆签名跨国交易所，欧洲交易量，交易已经放缓。然而，泛欧活动的强大飙升证明，投资者准备在邻近市场购买股票。它同样明确表示，该地区的贸易基础设施并没有充分支持它们。
One glaring deficiency was the lack of a comprehensive clearing and settlement system. Europe did not have a centralized processing entity akin to the U.S.'s Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. to facilitate cross-border trades, possibly leading to the creation of a single stock market.
The DTCC, a utility jointly owned by major U.S. exchanges and financial institutions, offered to help. It published a white paper in October 2000 promoting the idea of a European central counterparty, or CCP. By interposing itself in each transaction -- as a buyer to every seller and a seller to every buyer -- a CCP assumes settlement risk, freeing trading firms to put their resources into maintaining a liquid market.
然而，DTCC高管希望超越这一点“思想领导”。2001年12月，公司介绍了自己的CCP服务，欧洲中央交易对手。它占据了一个Thud：它唯一的客户，纳斯达克股市的刚刚结束了欧洲交易所，去年关闭。欧洲交易所不想购买美国繁殖的解决系统，注定EUROCCP。
Despite all this, the DTCC's concept survived. CCPs have been sprouting up all over Europe. In the past year Euronext and its archrival, Deutsche Börse, have launched major CCP initiatives with pan-European and even global ambitions. Other exchanges, including Milan's Borsa Italiana, started CCPs with a more regional scope.
“美国市场需要15至20年，以发展进入其目前的集中模式，”DTCC发言人Stuart Goldstein说明。“欧洲在短期内取得了重大进展。”
实际上，有些人想知道是否有太多的CCP。该业务略微不太低于交易市场的分散和分散。
欧洲委员会作为协调市场实践的一部分，已开始评估CCP的影响。2月份发布的指令草案呼吁开放，跨境竞争为确保清算效率的最佳方式。
However, securities industry officials differ over whether CCPs are best operated as mutually owned, DTCC-like utilities or as for-profit competitive ventures. A successful profit-making CCP with sufficient economies of scale tends to devour its competition and could grow into a monopoly, requiring regulatory controls, some experts warn.
“基于伦敦的顾问卢比·李某和市场结构的有影响力的书作者，鲁宾·李说，这是非常困难的竞争，”市场结构有影响力的竞争，什么是交流？金融市场的自动化，管理和监管。“使用CCP的交易者数量越大，通过它的资产数量越大，成本节约和其他效率的形式越大。”
Diana Chan, London-based director of Citigroup Global Transaction Services, agrees that bigger, more consolidated CCPs are better but adds, "In the public interest, for-profit monopolies are not a good idea."
No monopoly or single utility has emerged as yet, but the number of competitors has started to dwindle: The London Clearing House merged in December with Euronext's Paris-based affiliate, Clearnet, to form LCH.Clearnet Group. It's competing on a for-profit basis against Deutsche Börse affiliate Eurex Clearing and other regional clearinghouses.
CCPs appeared first in the futures markets -- the Chicago Board of Trade formed its Clearing Corp. in 1925 -- where traders participate in complex transactions that may take weeks or months to be paid and settled. CCPs carry the risk that either party might be unable to cover its settlement obligation.
对CCP的需求也在现金证券市场中发展，以及更多交易卷产生的风险以及越来越自动的交易匹配。“现在有一个非常重要的可能性，公司正在处理他们从未听说过的交易对手，因此不知道其风险简介，”伦敦咨询公司的创始人 - 咨询的创始人林顿琼斯。
CCPs further reduce settlement risk by netting out the end-of-day credit and debit positions of market participants, lowering the amount of money that has to move within the clearinghouse.
底线？eurex是DeutscheBörse和SWX瑞士交易所共同拥有的衍生品交易所的子公司表示，在2003年4月推出股票中共股权后，德意志贝尔斯的XETRA电子贸易体系的流动性上涨了27％。Eurex先前启动了债券（2000年10月）和REPOS（2001年7月），估计该设施将XETRA参与者每月减少二千万（2400万美元）。
这有助于解释为什么CCP已经增强。罗宋斯塔利亚国于2003年5月开设了一项现金证券，一年后开设了一个衍生品。此外，瑞士清算室Sis Segaintersettle为基于伦敦的VIST-X的SIS X-Clear，SIS X-Clear，SIS X-Clear-x，SWX拥有的电子交流。西班牙期货和期权市场Meff随着9月与Mefdclear遵循。
传统的交换不是唯一拥抱模型的交换。纽约政府证券经纪坎特雷茨·菲茨杰拉德担任CCP，以便在去年年底推出该公司的外汇平台上的匿名交易。
A CCP will be in place at the inception of the Dubai International Financial Exchange, which Bourse-Consult's Jones will run. Scheduled to open in the first quarter of 2005, the fully electronic exchange will use LCH.Clearnet as its CCP. "In Dubai we want to trade a variety of products, such as equities, derivatives, funds and bonds," Jones explains. "In this environment traders can net products out, which will be very useful. Moreover, Western banks may be reluctant to trade with Middle Eastern banks because they do not know them. If you insert a CCP, you remove the risk element and encourage trading on both sides."
Mirroring the rivalry between Euronext and Deutsche Börse, LCH.Clearnet and Eurex are taking their CCP battle global. LCH.Clearnet won the first big victory in November, retaining the London Stock Exchange's business after agreeing to cut its clearing fees by 25 percent. The deal will remain exclusive for no more than three years, the LSE says, to "perpetuate competitive tension between for-profit clearing organizations in the best interests of the U.K. equity market and the exchange's strategic flexibility."
LCH.ClearNet已经拥有广泛的多程序客户群，包括Euroonext和其子公司之一，伦敦国际金融期货和期权交流，以及洲际交流，伦敦金属交换和在线市场Brokertec，MTS组和Virt-x（其成员可以选择使用SIS X-Clear）。
Because of regulatory differences between the U.K. and France, LCH.Clearnet operates a discrete CCP in each country. The clearinghouse plans to integrate the two CCPs gradually and expects to have a common set of membership criteria, single-user accounts across all product lines and a fully consolidated technology platform in place within three to four years. As a "virtual single CCP," LCH.Clearnet offers firms trading a wide range of products on exchanges and over-the-counter markets the ability to choose where they consolidate their posttrade processing and position-holding -- a key competitive advantage, says company CEO David Hardy. Those choices will widen with additional clearing centers; the company has applied to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to extend its derivatives clearing to the U.S., where it will compete with Eurex US.
从其最近的指令草案,欧盟的t about to set restrictions on CCPs. It favors "an integrated, barrier-free environment . . . in full conformity with the European Union's competition rules."
But competition among CCPs can't last, predicts consultant Lee, because "once one begins to net most of the transactions in a particular asset class, it will be in the interests of everyone else to send transactions through the same netting machine." Even a new entrant with lower fees would be unlikely to take business away from a CCP that has achieved critical mass, says Lee.
这是因为成本不是CCP选择的唯一决定因素。参与者可能更愿意在一个平台上管理资产和抵押品，使一个市场中的盈余能够涵盖另一个市场的赤字。花旗集团的陈设想“跨市场和横断面的抵押品要求，这意味着风险可以在市场和部门的投资组合中抵消。”例如，交易者可以避免通过在西班牙Telefónica中抵消长职位，在法国Télécom的职位上抵消了长期职位。
"The market is still a long way from that," allows Chan. But if institutions and exchanges agree that they have much to gain from a consolidated European CCP, then they now have every opportunity to vote for it with their feet.