Centre of liquidity
We are the world centre of liquidity for the trading of short-term Euro denominated exchange traded derivatives contracts, with our Euribor futures and options contract suite which is now an established global benchmark, used throughout the world to gain and manage exposure to European interest rates. This benchmark status reflects both the concentration of global liquidity in our contract suite and also the increasing use of the Euro as an international reserve currency. Additionally, we are also the centre of liquidity for Sterling and Swiss exchange-traded short term interest rate derivatives with our Short Sterling and Euroswiss contract suites.

Our STIR portfolio also provides exposure to Japanese interest rates, via our Euroyen futures contract, during the European trading day.

Extending coverage
Our STIR portfolio of contracts are also complemented by Liffe's bond and Swapnote® contracts, which provide longer-dated exposure to key European, Sterling and Japanese benchmarks. Our Swapnote® contract, for example, provides two, five and ten-year exposure to the euro swap yield curve, extending our coverage of euro interest rates and complementing our Eonia and Euribor contracts. Likewise, our Long Gilt and Japanese Government Bond contracts complement our Short Sterling and Euroyen contracts.

New developments

Additional STIR contract delivery months - New delivery months are now available in a number of our flagship short term interest rate futures contracts. We have introduced "Green" delivery months (the next four quarterly delivery months) in Euroswiss futures and "purple" delivery months (quarterly delivery months 22 to 24) in Euribor and Sterling futures. Please see General Notice LON3009 for further details.

Half ticks introduced into Liffe's Short Sterling futures contracts - Meeting the need for greater precision in pricing in this contract, we have reduced the tick size of Short Sterling futures from 1 basis point to 0.5 basis points across all delivery months with effect from 25 March 2008. Please see London Notice 2994 for further details.

New short end trading opportunities - Eonia futures - Liffe will launch new one month Eonia and three month Eonia Swap Index futures contracts on 16 June 2008. These contracts have been developed in order to enhance the existing hedging opportunities provided by our comprehensive STIR derivatives products, as well as to provide new spread trading opportunities within the STIR portfolio.

Please see London Notice 3031 (14 May 2008) and London Notice 3042 (3 June 2008) for further details.

Extended trading hours for Euribor® - We have extended the trading hours of our flagship Euribor futures contract into the Asian trading day. The contract now opens at 01:00Hrs London time and is supported by market makers during this early trading session. Please see General Notice 2860 and General Notice 2904 for further details, or Open for business in Asia.

Current trading performance

Liffe's fixed income portfolio
Our STIR derivative contracts form part of Liffe's fixed income portfolio, which also encompasses bond and Swapnote® futures and options contracts covering the key European, American and Japanese benchmarks. Together, they represent the broadest range of fixed income derivatives contracts offered by any derivative exchange.

All of these contracts are traded on LIFFE CONNECT® with central margining and clearing provided by LCH.Clearnet Ltd. Our customers can trade these products on one electronic trading platform, using one set of trading rules and one clearing house. Together with competitive fees this makes trading Liffe's fixed income portfolio simple, efficient and cost effective.

Find out more
For further information on Liffe's STIR derivative portfolio, please contact Liffe's Fixed Income Derivatives team on:
Tel: 44 (0)20 7379 2222
Email: stirs@liffe.com