FICC, the Fixed Income Clearing Corporation under DTCC, has rolled out new clearing capabilities ahead of the SEC’s expanded Treasury clearing rules set for 31 March. The enhancements, including an upgraded Agent Clearing Service and customer margin segregation, allow firms to separate house and client activity. Despite the SEC extending mandatory clearing deadlines, FICC continues to attract more participants and process record-high volumes in U.S. Treasury transactions, reports DTCC in a press release.
Despite the SEC extending deadlines for mandatory clearing, FICC has seen a steady increase in both volumes and participants. The daily average of cleared U.S. Treasury transactions has risen from US$4.5 trillion before the SEC’s rule proposal to over US$9 trillion today. February saw multiple days where volumes exceeded US$10 trillion. Buy-side activity in FICC’s Sponsored Service has also grown, with an 85 per cent increase compared to the previous year.
FICC estimates that nearly half of the Treasury repo transactions covered by the SEC’s requirements are already being centrally cleared, with U.S. Money Market Funds accounting for about 46 per cent of that total. Additional updates to Sponsored and Agent Clearing Services are expected later in 2025 to further improve margin and capital efficiencies.
Risk management
As volumes and membership expand, FICC has introduced new risk management tools, including enhanced cross-margining arrangements and a new client reporting portal. To improve monitoring, intraday exposure assessments are now conducted every 15 minutes.
