Financial institutions use exotic credit derivatives to improve correlation and volatility risk management as well as to form the basis for new, alternative credit structures. Products traded include:

• Credit Indices and Index Swaptions eg. DJ CDX, iTraxx
• Basket Default Swaps eg, first to default, second to default
• iTraxx and DJ CDX Tranches and Bespoke Tranches
• Single name Credit Default Swaptions

These structures allow new flexibility in credit trading, specifically:

• Flexibility to cancel or extend credit protection to match changing credit conditions, views and strategies
• Simplifying management of broad market exposure
• Sourcing extra liquidity in secondary CDOs and tailored synthetic CDO tranches
• Efficient correlation and volatility risk management

Trading in new markets requires analytics and market data. Both the buy and sell sides can benefit from GFI’s price discovery software and market data, designed to support trading and liquidity.

GFI FENICS® Credit 

Developed in partnership with renowned academics John Hull and Alan White, GFI FENICS® Credit is a pricing and portfolio management tool for both the credit default swap and exotic credit derivatives markets.

Market Data 

GFI collects, cleanses and stores the prices from its global brokerage desks and its electronic trading platform GFI CreditMatch®.
Both buy- and sell-side institutions benefit from:

• Over 2.4 million price points dating from 1999, increasing by approximately 66,000 each month
• More than 3,000 reference entities, representing international corporates and sovereigns
• 3,000 prices or trades captured each day from GFI CreditMatch®, totalling approximately 66,000 prices or trades a month
• Over 18 million GFI FENICS® Credit calculated prices
• GFI FENICS® Credit curves calculated for 2,000 curves daily. Curves consisting of seven points from 1y to 10yrs, totalling 250,000 CDS curve points per month
• Sector, region, currency and ratings based classifications to assist market and data analysis
• Real market bids and offers reflecting accurate market sentiment

For more information on GFI FENICS® Credit and GFI's credit market data see the 'Data and Analytics' menu above.