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Michael March – Director, Corporate Communications
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LCH.Clearnet breaks all-time records in clearing equity markets

London, 14  August 2007

LCH.Clearnet is very pleased to announce that its EquityClear® service, which provides central counterparty services to the London Stock Exchange SETS and SETSmm central order book, as well as to virt-x, the pan-European stock exchange, cleared 1,257,217 London Stock Exchange trades last Thursday, a new record for the service, following the previous day’s EquityClear landmark first “million trades” day.

Today’s resulting net settlement volume of 13,017 settlements constitutes a reduction of over 99% on eligible gross settlement obligations.

LCH.Clearnet Ltd started clearing for the London Stock Exchange in February 2001. At the beginning of the service, volumes were approximately 40,000 trades per day, but grew steadily to the present, where average daily volumes in July 2007 stood at 547,000 trades. In total, the service has cleared just over 315 million trades since launch.

Also on Thursday, LCH.Clearnet SA cleared 1,164,816 trades executed on the cash segment (NYSE Euronext stock exchanges in Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels and Lisbon, together with London Stock Exchange Dutch Trading Service). This also constitutes an all-time record since LCH.Clearnet SA started cash markets clearing in 1990. The settlement volume of 15,600 settlements represents a reduction of just under 99% on gross settlement obligations.

Roger Liddell, Group Chief Executive at LCH.Clearnet, said: “I am delighted to note these landmark figures, demonstrating LCH.Clearnet’s key position at the heart of Europe’s financial markets. These increasing volumes not only have demonstrated the stability of our clearing platforms during a period of greatly increased trading activity, but will also help to reduce unit costs, paving the way for further fee reductions across all markets.”

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Note to Editors

LCH.Clearnet is currently owned 67.6% by users, 17.8% by exchanges with the balance of 14.6% being held by Euroclear. Upon completion of the Euronext share buy-back programme by 2009, the Group will be owned 73.3% by users, 10.9% by exchanges and 15.8% by Euroclear.

LCH.Clearnet is committed to operating under strict principles of non-discrimination across its user base. LCH.Clearnet serves major international exchanges and platforms, equity, exchange-traded derivatives, energy, interbank interest rate swaps markets and the majority of the Euro-denominated and sterling bond and repo markets.