Annual report 2016

Information technology

In 2016, the Supervisory Board approved a programme for the development of Moscow Exchange's information technology system for a period of three years that aims to ensure balanced development of the IT architecture, business processes, financial support and resources.

KEY EVENTS IN 2016
  • DataSpace1 became MOEX's primary data center
  • TWIME, a new transactional binary protocol for the Derivatives Market, was offered for trading clients

Upgrade of the Trading and Clearing System

The project set to segregate the trading and clearing components of Moscow Exchange is on-going. It will boost reliability and performance of MOEX's systems. In the first phase of the project, the trading and risk modules of the Derivatives Market system (SPECTRA) were segregated. ASTS+, a new trading and clearing system with trading and clearing modules for the FX Market, was put into commercial operation. After the launch, the transaction processing performance of the Derivatives Market and FX Market tripled. The ultimate goal of the modernisation of the Exchange's trading and clearing infrastructure is to extend its life span by 10 years. The project will continue in 2017.

A new Derivatives Market access protocol, TWIME, was developed and put into operation. It significantly reduced the average latency and order placement time. Unlike the Exchange’s previous generation of protocols, TWIME unlocks opportunities for trading members and, together with the FAST data streaming protocol, provides the optimal solution for robotised trading. The TWIME protocol does not require installation of specialised software on the client’s hardware while supporting any trading operating system and any programming language. The protocol minimises the time required to encrypt/decrypt transferred data both for the Exchange and for the client, and thanks to standardisation it does not require considerable resources for development. At the end of 2016, the TWIME protocol was used for execution of more than 40% of Derivatives Market transactions.

New Integration Architecture

In 2016, Moscow Exchange developed and introduced the Exchange Information Fabric (EIF) integration platform featuring service-oriented architecture and using state-of-the-art integration technologies to support interaction of applications.

In 2016, MOEX rolled out EIF-based cross margining, risk netting between the FX and Derivatives Markets, and a new model of interaction of the trading and clearing system with the central counterparty’s system required to implement the Unified Collateral Pool service, the Exchange’s key project for 2017.

Business Projects

In 2016, the projects of repo trading with participants’ clearing certificates and discrete auctions in the FX Market were rolled out based on the ASTS trading and clearing system. On the FX Market, MOEX introduced off-order-book trading in deliverable futures, and provided client level access (the third level settlement code can be registered for the client) and the clearing member’s option to terminate unsettled obligations in transactions executed by a trading member with one settlement code. Automated processing of client registration files sent by members to the Exchange was also rolled out.

The most significant SPECTRA-based business projects were “Unified Pool: Phase 1”, “Best Retail Investor”, “Asset Manager Ranking” and “I am an Investor”.

Data Warehousing

Moscow Exchange rolled out the Exadata Database Machine, significantly improving market data processing speeds and enabling MOEX to leverage its extensive expertise in Oracle technologies. The new hardware and software solution was successfully connected to the existing data streams. At present, Moscow Exchange and the regulator employ it to extract data on trading results. The Master Data Management system was implemented within the scope of the enterprise data warehouse project with the first two directories introduced: “Financial Instruments” and “Counterparties”.

Infrastructure

In 2016, Moscow Exchange completed the relocation of its primary data centre to Dataspace. Relocation to a state-of-the-art, highly reliable, Tier III-compliant data centre helped to improve the quality of services and access to Moscow Exchange’s markets. The М1 data centre has been in operation as the Exchange’s standby data centre since November 2016.

Additionally, at Dataspace Moscow Exchange built and rolled out a new co-location zone with a fundamentally new network architecture design minimising trading access latency and ensuring the highest reliability for clients engaged in high-frequency trading. Completion of relocation of client equipment from the old co-location zone at М1 to Dataspace is planned for the first quarter of 2017. Moscow Exchange intends to expand the co-location zone and develop new co-location services by 2020.

The technical policy setting out the IT infrastructure standards was drafted and approved. In accordance with the technical policy, obsolete server and network equipment and data storage systems were replaced.

Relocation to a state-of-the-art, highly reliable, Tier III-compliant data centre helped to improve the quality of services and access to Moscow Exchange’s markets.

System Resilience

To mitigate failure risks, Moscow Exchange changed its network infrastructure to a segmented topology with segregation of computer networks into the trading, corporate and game/testing segments.

In 2016, to improve the Exchange’s trading infrastructure safety, dedicated access servers of the Equity & Bond Market and the FX Market were relocated from participants’ premises to MOEX's data centres. A similar project for the Derivatives Market’s dedicated access servers is to be implemented by 2020.

To ensure high reliability and quality of the trading systems, new test facilities were set up for acceptance testing, SPECTRA functional testing and for the ASTS+ system in the FX Market.

Market Access

In 2016, the number of points of presence in the UK and the USA was increased, which doubled the client base compared to 2015. The global infrastructure development strategy also covers MOEX’s expansion in Asia (Hong Kong, Singapore and Shanghai).

Qualitative parameters of FAST data streaming protocol, as the fastest means of market data access, were upgraded. Along with FIX/FAST, the standard access protocols, international participants gained access to trading via software terminals.

Development of network-based services by 2020 assumes creating a new service model, setting up a shared network hub, building cooperation with telecommunications operators, and refining the model of interaction with extranet operators.