Section 04 · 4 entries
Clearing & Settlement
Why it takes days.
Four entries on the interval between agreeing a trade and completing it, and on the institutions that occupy that interval.
Stamps, dockets and trays. The interval between a trade and its completion is a desk, and desks like it.
Photo: Ylanite Koppens / PexelsThe entries
- 04 · 1
Why settlement takes days
Between agreeing a trade and exchanging cash for title there is netting, confirmation and delivery. The delay is administrative history, not physics.
- 04 · 2
The central counterparty
An institution that stands between both sides so neither has to trust the other.
- 04 · 3
Netting
Thousands of obligations collapsed into a few payments.
- 04 · 4
Failure to deliver
What the plumbing does when something does not arrive.