In late 2018 we reported that the DTCC had started testing its updated credit derivatives Trade Information Warehouse (TIW) that uses DLT. The current version is responsible for processing $10 trillion of cleared and bilateral derivatives. But there’s been no public news since then. We can now report that it’s currently on track for late 2022.
The TIW serves as the golden record for bilateral credit derivatives. The platform provides payment calculations, settlement services via CLS and processes credit events.
Fifteen global banks were testing the solution in 2018 and the launch date was expected in 2019. And the DTCC confirmed to Ledger Insights that the TIW functional development is complete and has been tested by DTCC, industry partners, dealers, buy-side firms, CCPs, vendors and service providers.
The delay is that TIW has a major external dependency.
“For several years, DTCC and IHS Markit have been working together to modernize the credit market infrastructure, one of the industry’s largest and most complex initiatives to date. As part of this effort, both DTCC and IHS Markit are transforming the platforms through which they provide their respective offerings using industry-leading innovative technologies,” said a DTCC spokesperson.
The upgraded TIW will use data from IHS Markit’s new TradeServ credit matching platform. And both solutions are being upgraded simultaneously. In a ten trillion-dollar industry. Yikes.
So we asked IHS Markit how it’s going with the new version of TradeServ. It’s already launched for foreign exchange products, but credit matching is only expected to go live in Q3 2022.
Back over to the DTCC: “Given the interdependence between DTCC’s TIW and IHS Markit’s credit matching and confirmation offerings, both platforms will be launched simultaneously following the launch of TradeServ and after extensive testing by the two firms and with the industry,” said the DTCC spokesperson. So while the DTCC didn’t provide dates, we’re guessing Q3 2022 must be the target for now.
The TIW project uses Axoni‘s blockchain technology that’s derived from Ethereum.
Meanwhile, the DTCC has plenty of other blockchain interests. It’s an active proponent of elevating DLT security standards and improving governance. And last year, it ran trials for tokenizing private securities on Ethereum, and exploring shortening settlement times.
