Capitolis Sees Record September as Novations Momentum Builds

Although regulation, especially SA-CCR, has been a part of many institutions’ lives for some time, as we near 2025, more are facing the reality of being “in scope” of the capital rules – and are turning to optimisation providers to help alleviate the pain.

This has been reflected in a release from Capitolis which states the firm has just hit another record on its Novations platform, with over $485 billion in gross notional reduced and 4,510 trades novated in September alone. Markets were clearly busy over the past two months, leading to higher volumes all round, but interestingly the firm says that along with FX prime brokers, more buy-side firms are joining the service.

Year-to-date, Capitolis says that completed trades on the platform are up 37%, while the gross notional reduced in up 15%. Given the aforementioned expansion of SA-CCR, this is unlikely to be the last record reported by the firm. It says it is engaging in ongoing collaboration with the buy-side and prime brokers to increase their initiations, as well as with executing brokers to expedite their approval process to increase overall completions. Improved functionality and technology advances on the platform, including auto initiation and internal workflow, have contributed to increased adoption, adds the firm, which launched fast-track novations on its service earlier this year, and is working to introduce new functionality aimed at reducing the number of required approvals and manual interventions further.

“We have seen tremendous growth with prime brokers and clients joining the platform and a strong pipeline of more planning to join in the coming months,” says Ben Tobin, head of Europe, Capitolis. “We continue to work with our expanding network on a very exciting roadmap for future product enhancements.”