Press

On June 22, 1998, the partners in Euro Alliance will launch derivatives contracts on the new Dow Jones STOXX^® indexes: Options and futures based on the Dow Jones STOXX^®50 (covering the whole Europe) as well as options and futures on the Dow Jones Euro STOXX^® 50 (covering the euro zone).

These new products are the first result of the Euro Alliance whose goal is the full convergence of today's different platforms to a joint architecture allowing a decentralized, equal and standardized access for all members. The four contracts will initially be listed both on the NSC system (MONEP-MATIF) and the DTB system, the upcoming trading platform for Eurex (the combined derivatives market of DTB and SOFFEX). Once the clearing link between the two platforms is installed, which is scheduled for mid 1999, the contracts will be traded on one platform only.

The new contracts follow the standards of most European index derivatives with identical contract specifications for both platforms. They will be quoted in Euro (in Ecu until 31 December 1998) and have a contract size of Euro 10 (Ecu 10) per index point. Futures will have quarterly expirations up to 9 months. Options expirations will be the three nearest months, three quarterly maturities and two half-yearly maturities, up to two years; options will be European-style. For all contracts expiry date is set at the third Friday of the expiration month.

The two underlying indexes belong to the new European Dow Jones STOXX^® index family developed by SBF-Bourse de Paris, Deutsche Börse, Swiss Exchange and Dow Jones & Company, that were launched on February 26, 1998. They are based on 50 blue-chips covering Europe as a whole (Dow Jones STOXX^® 50) and the in-countries of EMU (Dow Jones Euro STOXX^® 50), respectively. Given their narrow scope, stable sample, high representativeness and continuous dissemination, they constitute appropriate underlyings for derivative products. At the same time they are still small enough to allow arbitrage. This will guarantee fair pricing and high liquidity.

The implementation of the Euro, the single European currency, at the beginning of 1999, is encouraging investors to widen and diversify their portfolios to give them a European scale. The Dow Jones STOXX^® index family and their derivatives serve as an ideal diversification vehicle and a benchmark and hedging instrument within this new environment. With futures and options on both indexes portfolio management can be done in the same quality in a European dimension than before in national dimensions.

We add the contract specifications for your information.