Board-Ansicht
Mix-Ansicht- Ungewöhnliche Handelsaktivitäten VOR der EZB Entscheidung (Zinssenkung) - black elk, 14.05.2001, 09:05
- kann ich bestätigen mkT - non olet, 14.05.2001, 13:18
Ungewöhnliche Handelsaktivitäten VOR der EZB Entscheidung (Zinssenkung)
Ist die EZB hier ein lustiger Altherrengesangsverein?
05/13 14:55
ECB Declines to Comment on Report of `Leak' Before Rate Cut
By Rainer Buergin
Frankfurt, May 13 (Bloomberg) -- The European Central Bank and a U.K. market regulator declined to comment on a newspaper report citing unidentified Liffe futures traders as saying there was a ``leak'' before the ECB's rate cut Thursday.
``We do not comment on this,'' said ECB press spokeswoman Regina Schueller. Robin Gordon-Walker, a spokesman for the U.K. Financial Services Authority, said, ``We don't comment on newspaper reports, whether we're having an investigation or not.''
The Independent on Sunday, without naming its sources, said the FSA and the London International Financial Futures and Options Exchange, or Liffe, are investigating unusual trading before the European Central Bank unexpectedly lowered interest rates Thursday.
``Futures traders believe the bank's decision to cut rates to 4.5 percent leaked out early,'' the paper said. Options traded ``heavily'' on the markets Wednesday, and by the end of Thursday morning Liffe had had its busiest day since it moved to electronic trading, the newspaper said.
All but one of the 38 economists and investors surveyed by Bloomberg News expected the ECB's rate-setting panel to keep its main refinancing rate at 4.75 percent last Thursday.
``There's been lots of activity in the futures markets in general recently; Thursday was a record day since we moved to electronic trading, said Liffe spokeswoman Jane Sweet in a telephone interview. ``I don't know that there was anything suspicious'' on Thursday.
Short-Dated Options
Sweet also said she ``wouldn't confirm or comment'' on the report in the Independent.
On Thursday, 1.15 million three-month Euribor futures contracts traded on Liffe, according to Bloomberg Data. That compares with 475,078 contracts on Wednesday and 399,603 on Friday.
A future is a contract to trade an asset or index at a specific price at a later date. Liffe is Britian's largest futures exchange.
One of the trades involved short-dated options, which were sold Wednesday and expire tomorrow, the paper said. In the other trade, at 11:45 a.m. Thursday, one buyer bought so much of a European interest-rate product that the rate moved by 0.04 percent. The ECB announced its decision at 12:45 p.m. London time.
The FSA and Liffe are particularly interested in two sets of trades, one through a Swiss bank and the other through a U.S. company, the paper reported.
``It is understood that Liffe has identified which traders carried out the deals and wants to talk to them before it takes any further action,'' the paper said.
The paper also said, without citing it sources, there were ``strong suggestions'' that the U.S. company was active in U.S. interest-rate futures prior to an unexpected rate cut by the U.S. Federal Reserve on Jan. 3.
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