Bancolombia Goes Live with Murex MX.3 for Hedge Accounting

Bancolombia, Colombia’s biggest bank, has gone live with the Murex MX.3 platform for Hedge Accounting, further extending the bank’s use of the solution on AWS. The adoption supports compliance with IFRS 9, which requires banks to measure expected credit losses and manage interest rate risk in the banking book (IRRBB).

The MX.3 Hedge Accounting module automates hedge designation, effectiveness testing, reporting and accounting reclassification. It supports a range of hedge types, including fair value, cash flow and net investment hedges for foreign exchange transactions. This enables Bancolombia to enhance efficiency and ensure transparency in its accounting processes.

The project also ensures compliance with local regulation, including External Circular 025, while aligning with international standards. By broadening its use of MX.3 across fixed income, foreign exchange and derivatives, Bancolombia strengthens its front-to-back operations and risk management framework.

OSTTRA and HKEX Complete First USD/CNH Cross Currency Swap Compression Run

OSTTRA has announced the successful completion of its first compression run for USD/CNH cross currency swaps (CCS) cleared through HKEX’s OTC Clear, using its OSTTRA triReduce service. The pilot, conducted on 28 August with five financial institutions including Bank of China (Hong Kong) and Crédit Agricole CIB, compressed a notional value of $5.8bn. The exercise highlights the potential for significant capital efficiencies and risk reduction in a market where HKEX’s OTC Clear remains the sole CCP offering clearing for this contract, with outstanding volumes reaching $255.2bn in July 2025.

The initiative reflects growing demand for compression services in Asia, with OSTTRA reporting that compressed notional value in APAC currencies more than doubled in the first half of 2025 compared to the same period in 2024. Contracts closed so far in 2025 reached $33.1tn, more than double the total for 2023. Following the pilot’s success, OSTTRA plans to run a larger USD/CNH compression cycle on HKEX’s OTC Clear in the coming months.

BitGo Europe Secures BaFin Approval to Launch Regulated Crypto Trading Services

BitGo Europe GmbH, the digital asset infrastructure company, has received an extension of its licence from Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin). The approval allows BitGo Europe to expand its regulated offering to include crypto trading services from Frankfurt, enabling European institutional investors to access spot trading across a wide range of digital assets and stablecoins.

Through its over-the-counter (OTC) trading desk and electronic platform, BitGo Europe aggregates liquidity from multiple market makers and exchanges, offering clients competitive pricing and reliable execution. This expansion follows BitGo Europe’s initial MiCA licence approval from BaFin in May 2025, strengthening its regulated presence in the EU.

With custody, staking, transfer, and now trading services available under one framework, BitGo Europe positions itself as one of the few regulated custodians in the region to provide a full-stack platform. The integrated service aims to help institutions deploy capital more efficiently while maintaining security and compliance.

Monaco Launches Institutional-Grade Decentralised Trading Infrastructure on Sei Blockchain

Monaco, the decentralised trading protocol developed by Sei Labs and Monaco Research, has launched its central limit order book (CLOB) infrastructure on the Sei blockchain. The platform is designed to deliver Wall Street-level execution speeds within a decentralised framework, with the aim of capturing part of the projected $30 trillion tokenised asset market by 2034. Monaco achieves microsecond execution and leverages Sei’s 400-millisecond settlement, a major improvement over traditional T+1 settlement cycles.

Key features of Monaco’s infrastructure include a shared liquidity layer for broad institutional access, 24/7 trading support, and PitPass revenue sharing, which rewards builders and applications for contributing order flow. Unlike traditional payment for order flow models, PitPass distributes revenue transparently while maintaining best execution standards.

InTick Achieves ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Certification for Information Security

InTick, the listed derivatives blocking network, has been awarded the ISO/IEC 27001:2022 certification, a globally recognised standard for information security management. The certification, issued by Insight Assurance, confirms that InTick has implemented a structured framework to protect information assets, ensuring confidentiality, integrity, and availability across its operations.

This achievement follows a period of growth for the company, including the live launch of its block matching platform during the June ICE Gilt and Eurex Fixed Income futures rolls and the successful raising of £2 million in funding from angel investors in July 2025. InTick’s platform targets inefficiencies in listed derivatives block trading by offering a centralised source of pricing, electronic All-to-All client matching for fixed income and equities derivatives, and digitisation of manual workflows. The certification underscores the company’s commitment to secure and scalable trading solutions.

BNP Paribas and HSBC Join Canton Foundation to Advance Decentralised Financial Infrastructure

BNP Paribas and HSBC have become the newest members of The Canton Foundation, strengthening the growing institutional support for the Canton Network. Their participation follows the recent additions of Goldman Sachs, Hong Kong FMI Services Limited and Moody’s Ratings, underscoring the increasing strategic role of the network in the future of global financial infrastructure.

The Canton Network aims to enable tokenised finance through decentralised technology that safeguards data privacy, operational control and interoperability. Its Global Synchronizer provides the core infrastructure for connecting digital assets across permissioned blockchains, under the decentralised governance of a community of banks, fintechs and service providers.

With over 30 members now onboard, including Broadridge, Tradeweb and Digital Asset, the Canton Foundation continues to build a collaborative ecosystem. The inclusion of BNP Paribas and HSBC represents another step towards aligning global capital markets through a secure and scalable decentralised framework.

British Arab Commercial Bank Partners with Integral to Enhance FX Operations

British Arab Commercial Bank (BACB), a UK-based international wholesale bank, has selected Integral, a leading currency technology provider, to upgrade its foreign exchange operations. The move comes in response to growing client demand for more advanced FX capabilities.

The adoption of Integral’s technology will enable BACB to improve liquidity aggregation, pricing, distribution and white labelling. By integrating Integral’s price engine, the bank will be able to generate its own pricing for local currency pairs and deliver it through a fully branded, customisable web platform embedded alongside clients’ existing trading tools. This shift replaces manual processes, supports more competitive pricing, and strengthens BACB’s presence in Middle Eastern and African markets.

In addition, Integral’s platform will streamline workflows and improve transparency by reducing manual compliance tasks. This technology-driven approach marks a significant step in optimising BACB’s FX services and meeting the evolving needs of its global trade finance and treasury clients.

BlockFills and QIS Risk Partner to Enhance Institutional Portfolio Visibility and Risk Analysis

BlockFills, the digital asset trading and market technology provider, has partnered with QIS Risk, a portfolio monitoring solution for institutional crypto investors, to expand risk and performance analysis capabilities for their shared clients. The collaboration allows investors to gain a unified view of their portfolios across all asset classes, counterparties, investment types, and blockchain networks.

Through QIS Risk’s platform, BlockFills clients can now integrate their digital asset derivatives positions into a broader portfolio context. This consolidated perspective aims to improve decision-making by removing the limitations of counterparty-specific reporting and offering more comprehensive insights into overall exposure.

The partnership reflects growing institutional demand for digital asset options. BlockFills reported that its digital asset options volume in July rose 70% compared with the same month last year.

CME Group to Launch BrokerTec Chicago with Major Banks Trading U.S. Treasuries

CME Group has announced that Citigroup, J.P. Morgan and Morgan Stanley will participate in trading cash U.S. Treasuries on BrokerTec Chicago when it launches on 6 October. At launch, clients will be able to trade all seven of BrokerTec’s on-the-run benchmark U.S. Treasuries, offered in smaller notional sizes and tighter price increments to align with the futures market. Access will be available through existing CME Globex connectivity, including the BrokerTec API.

The BrokerTec marketplace for fixed income trading, covering benchmark U.S. Treasuries and U.S. and EU repo transactions, is operated by CME Group. In the first quarter of this year, it set a record with a $1.05 trillion single-day average daily notional volume across its trading platforms. CME Group also reported a record 8.8 million average daily contracts traded in its U.S. Treasury futures and options during 2025.

FCA Consults on LSEG Rooftop Access Proposals to Address Competition Concerns

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is investigating whether the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) and the landlord of its data centre building have restricted competition in the supply of low latency connectivity services (LLCS) between certain UK trading venues. Currently, only LSEG can place radio equipment on the rooftop of the data centre, which is crucial for providing high-speed connections between trading venues such as the LSE, Cboe Europe and ICE. The FCA is concerned this exclusivity could disadvantage rival LLCS providers.

To address these concerns, LSEG and the landlord have proposed ending LSEG’s exclusive rooftop rights. Under the commitments, LSEG would retain use of only part of the rooftop, while equivalent space would be made available to third parties on fair and reasonable terms. The FCA considers the proposals may resolve the competition issues and has launched a consultation before making a final decision on whether to accept the commitments and close its investigations.