Over a century of risk management excellence
LCH has been managing risk for over 100 years. Our journey has taken us from a small commodities clearing firm working out of a City of London backstreet, to a central counterparty that spans the globe, offering clearing services to customers across five continents and multiple asset classes.
Here is a taste of our story so far:
1888 – Establishment of the London Produce Clearing House (LPCH), which offered clearing services for futures contracts in coffee, sugar and other soft commodities.
1971 – LPCH was renamed the International Commodities Clearing House.
1988 – Business was acquired by a consortium of six banks.
1992 – The London Clearing House was born, signalling the firm’s intent to broaden its clearing offering beyond commodities.
1998 – RepoClear, a clearing service for repo and bond transactions, was launched. The service enables members to more efficiently manage their euro cash liquidity, as well as pool highly rated sovereign and agency general collateral trades with eligible investment-grade debt.
1999 – SwapClear, a service for clearing interest rate swaps (IRS), was launched. Today, SwapClear is open to buy-side clients, offering end-users clearing options in 21 currencies, with maturities of up to 50 years, and non-IRS instruments such as inflation swaps.
2001 – EquityClear, a clearing service for cash equities and cash equities equivalents, was launched. Through EquityClear, members and their clients are able to clear cash equities, Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs), Exchange Traded Commodities (ETCs) and Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) transacted on exchanges and trading venues located throughout Europe.
2003 – Merger between LCH and Paris-based central counterparty Clearnet. The merged company – renamed LCH.Clearnet – revolutionised our service offering expanding the range of products available for clearing.
2008 – LCH.Clearnet Ltd successfully resolved the $9 trillion notional IRS portfolio of the defaulted clearing member, Lehman Brothers. From a portfolio that comprised more than 66,000 trades, LCH SwapClear was able to fully resolve the default within three weeks and with no loss to its other clearing members.
2012 – London Stock Exchange Group PLC (LSEG) assumes a majority stake in LCH.Clearnet Group Ltd. Also, LCH launched LCH CDSClear, our credit default swap clearing service; and LCH ForexClear, offering currency markets a dedicated service for clearing NDFs and other foreign exchange products.
2016 – LCH.Clearnet Ltd was rebranded as LCH, "The Markets’ Partner”.
2017 – SwapAgent Ltd is established, providing a service to help simplify the processing, margining and settlement of non-cleared derivatives.
2018 – LSEG increases its majority shareholding in LCH to 82.6 per cent. SwapClear, LCH’s IRS clearing service, processes over $1,077 trillion in notional – the first time over $1 quadrillion has been cleared in one year.
2020 – LSEG formed its new post trade division, bringing together the LCH Group and UnaVista.
2021 – LSEG completes the all-share acquisition of Refinitiv to create a leading global financial markets infrastructure and data provider.
2023 – LCH Group becomes part of the new LSEG Post Trade brand, making it easier for customers to navigate and take full advantage of LSEG’s expanding risk management, optimisation and regulatory services.