BoG takes further step to deepen FX market

The Bank of Ghana has taken a further step in its quest to deepen the country’s foreign exchange market, through the adoption of new technology for automating FX trading.

The new technology, Refinitiv Spot Matching platform, is a trusted primary FX market platform with unique features designed to support an order book that ensures back-to-back trading with firm prices in a transparent fashion to encourage genuine trading interest.

At the launch of this platform, the Governor of the central bank, Dr. Ernest Addison said that the FX market is increasingly evolving and factors such as technology, regulation, security and structural changes are constantly driving market and industry behavior.

“As the Ghanaian FX market evolves, it is important to embrace international best practices and standard interbank trading conventions that will position Ghana as a preferred destination for investor equity and portfolio flows in Africa,” Dr. Addison said.

The Governor noted that the adoption of new technology continuous to play a critical role in automating the trading workflows and is supporting a drive towards further market electronification.

In February 2019 and October 2019, the Bank introduced the Ghana interbank market rules and forward FX auctions as means of reforming the FX market.

The Refinitiv Spot matching platform will serve as the market standard for interbank trading in lots of a minimum size of US$250,000.

The BoG expects that this platform will improve price discovery and transparency through real-time access to live prices for onshore and offshore stakeholders in the Ghana interbank FX market and deliver clear surveillance for Bank of Ghana.

This platform will also provide efficient execution of FX trades with no last look and counterparties will be screened for credit, thereby encouraging genuine interest to trade and client confidence.

This application will provide concentrated liquidity due to its all-to-all firm and aggregated liquidity as there is a single order book. Finally, all market data obtained from this platform will be a true reflection of market dynamics and it will eliminate duplicity of foreign currency demand from banks and their customers.

Currently, Refinitiv Spot Matching serves as the primary source of inter-bank liquidity in 27 currencies due to its distinctive features.