Big Banks Setting Up Online Derivatives Dealing Network

Chase Manhattan Bank, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley Dean Witter and Warburg Dillon Read said in a statement Monday they had signed a letter of intent that would give each an equal stake.

While initially targeted at professional dealers in benchmark swaps, the companies seek to expand the new system to all market participants, including end-user clients.

The system will be called SwapsWire. It is subject to regulatory and other approvals. After planned tests in the U.S. dollar and euro interest rate swaps market at the end of this year, it will be rolled out wider in the first quarter of 2001.