Patrice Renault, Chief Executive of LCH.Clearnet SA, said: "We are delighted to connect our Portuguese clearing members to CLEARING 21®. Transferring Portuguese derivatives products to our clearing system offers Portuguese customers a cheaper and direct access to Dutch, French and Belgian derivatives products. In addition, Portuguese derivatives benefit from a wider exposure and visibility to European and international investors."

C21 provides Portuguese derivatives clearing members with a real-time clearing and netting process. The former post-market overnight batch process required customers to wait until the next morning to check their cleared positions.

André Braz from Banco Santander de Negócios Portugal said: "From an operational point of view, the main advantage for us as a Clearing Member is the harmonisation of Derivatives and Cash Clearing systems on an unique platform. The facility to perform posting/give-up/take-up actions automatically using C21 messages and our middle office system is a huge improvement. Segregation between execution and clearing functions is a great improvement on the system previously used in Portugal."

Operating a single clearing system on the Belgian, Dutch, French and Portuguese cash and derivatives market enables clearing customers to optimise their post-trading organisation. Because these markets share the same technology, clearing members are able to offer cross-border services, and provide customers with greater choice.