Garda Capital Partners LP, an alternative asset manager focused on providing uncorrelated fixed income investment strategies, executed the first fully-electronic swaption on TW SEF at the end of Q3 2017. Eight swap dealers are live on the platform, with another four in the process of on-boarding.

Tradeweb now offers one of the most comprehensive rates derivatives offerings with the expansion into rates volatility products through the introduction of swaptions on its swap execution facility (SEF). Swaptions traders can leverage request-for-quote (RFQ) to put multiple liquidity providers in competition on Tradeweb, and may access two-way markets with request-for-market (RFM) functionality. Tradeweb offers a broad range of trading protocols delivering the ability to execute in competition, while supporting the processing of trades for increased operational efficiency.

"Our electronic workflow for swaptions offers a significant step forward with more efficient and transparent price discovery by utilizing TW SEF's leading technology and network," said Billy Hult, President of Tradeweb. "Clients who utilize Tradeweb will benefit from a streamlined experience that allows them to access more competitive pricing quickly and easily."

Unlike other derivatives products that are required to trade on SEFs, swaptions are not yet mandated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission as Made Available to Trade. However, electronic trading optimizes execution of swaptions trades using an automated audit trail and integration with risk management and other post-trade systems or processing.

"Tradeweb's platform delivers valuable two-way price transparency and an efficient solution for executing our swaptions trades," said Sean Hu, Portfolio Manager at Garda Capital Partners LP. "Electronic trading has increased our operational efficiency with vanilla rates derivatives, and it's a logical step to benefit from the same advantages with our swaptions business."