Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen,

Thank you for joining us for our briefing.

I have the pleasure of introducing two colleagues from HKEx Derivatives Market who are with me today: 

• Calvin Tai from Development & Operations, and

• Stanley Ho from Trading & Market Operations.

I shall begin my remarks with some background information about HKATS.

• The systems full name is Hong Kong Futures Automated Trading System.

• It was introduced in April 1999 as an upgrade to an electronic trading system that was introduced in 1995.  The upgrade increased both capacity and functionality. 

• The extra capacity was needed for Hang Seng Index Futures, which were successfully migrated to HKATS in June 2000, marking the end of open-outcry trading on HKExs exchanges. 

• All futures and options trading was consolidated on HKATS in August 2001 when stock options were moved to the system.

We are now upgrading the HKATS software from OMex 15.2 to OMex 17.1 as part of our commitment to maintaining a strong market infrastructure.  We have completed extensive preparation work and plan to make the upgrade on 6^th October.

OMex 17.1 software provides many benefits: 

• It delivers higher efficiency to the derivatives trading platform. 

• In addition, HKATS will have several new functions as a result of the upgrade. 

• The upgrade also paves the way for next years introduction of DCASS, the Derivatives Clearing and Settlement System, as OMEx 17.1 software is a core piece of the project and a prerequisite for the implementation of DCASS. 

The OMEx 17.1 software we are rolling out on 6^th October will be for HKATS only.  Later, we will roll out OMex 17.1 software that will be used jointly by HKATS and DCASS.

As a prudent measure, there will be a two-week stabilisation period following the introduction of the OMex 17.1 software on 6^th October.  We have also prepared contingency plans in case there are any unexpected incidents.  We will outline those plans later.            

Stanley Ho from Derivatives Market Trading & Operations will now explain the HKATS upgrade in detail.  Then, after his presentation, we will be glad to take any questions you might have. 

Thank you.