State Street Digital, Vanguard and Symbiont Partner on DLT Usage in FX Forwards Trading

State Street Corporation, the leading investment management company Vanguard and Symbiont, a blockchain technology provider, have jointly completed the margin calculation process for a live trade of a 30-day foreign exchange forward contract through the use of Assembly, Symbiont’s distributed ledger technology (DLT).

The firms have been actively exploring the innovative application of blockchain technology to undertake margin processing for foreign-exchange forwards and swaps, with the goal of bringing post trade workflow automation and efficiencies while significantly reducing counterparty credit risk in the over-the-counter currency market.

“State Street Digital is incredibly pleased to have collaborated with both Vanguard and Symbiont on this monumental industry initiative to digitize the margining process around collateralized foreign exchange forward contracts that will reduce our customers operational challenges through process automation and state of the art technologies,"said Nadine Chakar, head of State Street Digital.

"Vanguard is committed to improving outcomes for all investors, whether through lowering the cost of investing or reinvesting in new services and innovative capabilities,"said Warren Pennington, head of Vanguard’s Investment Management FinTech Strategies Group."We’re excited to partner with State Street and Symbiont on the world’s first ever digital collateral-linked currency forward trade margining process.”

“Today’s announcement marks a transformative time for financial services and signals the evolution of blockchain as the ideal technology solution for foreign exchange contracts,”said Mark Smith, CEO, Symbiont.”