Societe Generale Securities Services (SGSS), a leading custodian in the European market with a wide footprint in the major markets of the future Target-2 Securities (T2S) zone, has formally announced its firm intention to implement direct connectivity to the T2S platform.
T2S will provide participating central securities depositories with a single platform to which they may opt to outsource their securities settlement and position keeping. T2S will operate under a single set of harmonised operating rules and business processes which will bring down barriers to cross-border post-trade activities in Europe. Furthermore, T2S will provide real-time gross settlement in central bank money with the national central banks, providing opportunities to reduce liquidity requirements through cash pooling and collateral mobilisation across the zone.
SGSS will implement direct connectivity from the first wave of migration to T2S as of June 2015 for settlements of Italian and Swiss securities. SGSS will also act as Payment Bank in T2S to build on atrack record of providing cash to clients to support securities settlement and extend the geography of its current Euroclear Settlement of Euronext-zone Securities (ESES) markets liquidity management services. A new mechanism will also provide the option of distributing liquidity required for securities settlement in multiple markets through a single cash pool. SGSS expects to announce further direct connectivity links for the subsequent sets of markets that will migrate in 4 waves from June 2015 to February 2017 to T2S.
In parallel, SGSS has signed a memorandum of understanding with SWIFT* for the provision of value added network services to materialise the connectivity to T2S.SGSS is a member of the T2S Advisory Group, Harmonisation Steering Group and many other key T2S-linked European and national bodies which promote the emergence and successful implementation of solutions to bring down the costs and risks of post-trade activities globally.
“This strong signal we are sending the market underlines our commitment to leveraging T2S to enhance our client service model and optimise our operational efficiency” underlines Massimo Cotella,Global Head of Coverage, Marketing & Liquidity Management at SGSS. “This is the just the first step of many down the T2S path that will strengthen SGSS’ position as a serious contender on the new playing field and support our one-stop-shop value proposition for access to settlement, custody, asset servicing only and liquidity management services across T2S markets. SGSS is investing up-fronttoday to better serve our clients tomorrow.”