OREANDA-NEWS. December 8, 2010. The winners of the FOW Awards for Innovation 2010 were announced on December 1, 2010 at the close of FOW's Derivatives World conference in London.

RTS Stock Exchange won two FOW Awards for Innovation 2010:

Best innovation by an exchange in the field of product design – Eastern Europe

RTS Standard Index Futures

Best innovation by an exchange in the field of customer service – Eastern Europe

RTS unified settlement on FORTS and RTS Standard

A futures contract on the RTS Standard Index started trading on FORTS, the derivatives market of RTS, on February 15, 2010. The RTS Standard Index is made up from 15 blue chips of the Russian cash equity market and is used as the underlying asset for the futures contract. The contract gives the opportunity to buy a portfolio composed of the 15 most liquid instruments of the Russian cash equity market through one trade. As a result, transactions are more cost-efficient and show maximum results compared to usage of these assets separately.

Transferring to the technology of unified settlement on FORTS and RTS Standard markets started on March 12, 2010. Unified settlement is the technology for simultaneous execution of deliverable futures contracts on securities on RTS FORTS market and equities transactions on the RTS Standard market, allowing market participants to net liabilities on both the derivative and stock markets. This technology  reduces the expense associated with realization of arbitrage strategies and  decreases operational risks during delivery execution. More detailed information on the unified settlement procedure and expiration/settlement dates of derivative contracts can be found in the presentation Unified settlement on FORTS and RTS Standard (ppt, 2Mb).

Since its launch in 1982, the professional trade magazine FOW has been at the heart of the futures and options business. Its subscribers and readers are global investment funds and banks, professional stock market participants as well as private investors all around the globe. FOW's Annual Awards for Innovation include seven regional awards for the best innovations by exchanges in the field of product design: North America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Middle East, Africa, East Asia, South and Southeast Asia and Australia. 

OJSC "Russian Trading System" Stock Exchange was founded in 1995. It is one of the leading stock exchanges and the leading trading venue for futures and options in Eastern Europe. It provides a wide range of opportunities to investors, professional institutions and their Russian and foreign clients for shares, bonds as well as derivatives trading.