London, 8 June 2011

The Baltic Exchange’s electronic marketplace for dry freight derivatives, Baltex, commenced trading today and executed its first trade at 07:33. Principals signed up and ready to trade include AM Nomikos, Cargill, CTM, Morgan Stanley, M2M, Pacific Basin and Toepfer.

Regulated by the UK’s Financial Services Authority (FSA) as a Multilateral Trading Facility, Baltex provides live FFA prices and on-line execution and supports straight through processing to the international clearing houses LCH and NOS, with SGX and CME expected to be added shortly. The transaction’s clearing status is displayed in real time.

The system is available for trading from 0730 to 1800 British Summer Time and can be made available initially to participants throughout the European Economic Area, Switzerland, Singapore and Monaco. Other jurisdictions are expected to follow shortly.

Announcing the launch Baltic Exchange Chairman Mark Jackson said: “The Baltic Exchange is proud to have brought Baltex so far and I am delighted that some of the market’s biggest traders are ready to trade from day one, they will be joined by others currently finalising their paperwork.  The shipping, financial and commodity sectors now have a centralised, transparent and regulated marketplace in which dry freight derivatives can be traded. We expect Baltex to attract new companies in the coming months and support greater liquidity in the FFA market.”

Baltex can be used by both brokers and principals and has been developed in close collaboration with the market. All live prices can be seen by Baltex screen members, but the trader’s identity is kept anonymous to all except the nominated broker. As well as a live trading screen, a view only option will be available to those who simply want to see the depth of the market. This view only mode will also be made available through quote vendors.

Baltex is designed to be an easy to use tool for freight derivatives traders. It incorporates a fully bespoke screen layout, built-in warnings and functionality which can be tailored to traders’ needs as well as an Application Programming Interface (API) which can be used to interface into in-house systems.

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