EuroCCP, the pan-European cash equities clearing house, today announced that it has become interoperable on BATS Europe and UBS MTF. EuroCCP has been selected by BofA Merrill Lynch, Credit Suisse, Morgan Stanley and Nomura as the Preferred CCP on the BATS Europe Interoperable Clearing Service and by Citigroup, through its Global Transaction Services third party clearing business on UBS MTF.

The BATS Europe Preferred Interoperable Clearing Service enables trading firms to elect a Preferred CCP to clear their trades. Under this new service, if trading firms on both sides of a trade have selected a Preferred CCP, then each side will be cleared by the respective CCP of choice.

Firms trading on UBS MTF, the latest fully interoperable execution venue, will be able to choose EuroCCP to clear their cash equities trades as it interoperates with the incumbent CCP.

EuroCCP recently announced a new fee structure, which came into effect on 1 August, under which participants will not be charged clearing fees for transaction volumes over 230,000 sides a day. This translates into an actual fee cap of €4,300 for EuroCCP customers trading an average daily volume of over 230,000 sides.

Commenting on the announcement, Diana Chan, CEO, EuroCCP, said: "This is huge progress towards achieving true competition in clearing and great news for our clients. EuroCCP has already seen interoperable clearing activity thanks to the support of these participants who will now benefit from greater choice in clearing."

"We are hoping the success of these initiatives will encourage other trading venues to follow suit in implementing interoperability. If there is wider adoption of interoperability across more trading venues, the European equities trading landscape will be transformed and market participants will truly benefit from greater competition and lower costs."