Omgeo expands straight-through processing service

Omgeo, the global trade management services provider, said 17 firms had signed up to its global straight-through processing platform, Omgeo Central Trade Manager (CTM), a central matching product for domestic and cross-border trades.

The firms, which include Citigroup, Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, Goldman Sachs, Lazard Asset Management and Morgan Stanley, will use the platform for real-time settlement instruction and notification messaging.

Data integrity and settlement efficiency are helped by the combination of industry codes of practice, plus local market standards. Investors using the new XML-based platform will still be able to process their global trades with brokers that continue to use CTM's predecessor, Oasys Global. Pricing for early adopters will be similar to current pricing on the Oasys Global system.

"Omgeo CTM is an appropriate solution for a firm like ours that deals with hundreds of different brokers all over the world," said John Riccardi, senior vice-president of Lazard Asset Management. "We can immediately gain the benefits of the latest cross-border straight-through processing technology, without losing access to those of our brokers who are operating in the Oasys Global environment."

Omgeo currently serves more than 1,200 brokers globally through its existing network of services. The firm is part-owned by the US Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation - the largest financial services post-trade infrastructure organisation in the world.