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IN BRIEF
The Paris Bourse reported record trading activity for the month of July. Daily trading volumes averaged EUR 2.886 billion, almost 40 percent higher than in 1998. July's record volume is second only to June's record setting EUR 2.941 average daily volume. The amount of total trading so far in 1999 surpasses the amount in 1998 by 27.6 percent with over EUR 380 billion traded.
The Chicago Mercantile Exchange also experienced record trading activity during the month of July, with total volume increasing 16 percent over last year. The CME attributes the gain to growth in interest rate and equity index products. Many contracts in the CME's main product areas, including currency and agricultural products, also posted July records. In addition, with almost 8 million contracts traded, the CME's benchmark Eurodollar futures contract increased 42.1 percent over July 1998.
Sumitomo Electric Industries Japan has announced the formation of TCAM Japan, a software subsidiary that will market and distribute TCAM Systems' applications in Japan. Existing TCAM applications will be translated from English into kanji, the Japanese character set, for the Japanese market. Sumitomo Electric expects TCAM Japan to grow to 50 employees by the end of the year and will begin the product rollout with the Advanced Order Management (AOM), TCAM's web-enabled order management, compliance and order routing system. The AOM will be enhanced with a standardized API to enable clients to access the system via the Internet.
Security First Technologies is in the process of implementing its Virtual Financial Manger (VFM) Investments application at six financial institutions, including Royal Bank Financial Group, Security First Network Bank and Synovus Financial. VFM Investments enables online transactional brokerage capabilities for customers with existing brokerage accounts. The application also allows users to transfer funds to brokerage accounts and purchase stocks in real-time and provides reporting capability for portfolio positions and trade activity information. The VFM Investments application is either licensed to the institution or run through the Security First Technologies Data Center.