Millennium IT increases presence in Africa

The MillenniumIT's Central Securities Depository (CSD) system was recently implemented at the Botswana Stock Exchange (BSE), turning it into one of Africa's best performing stock exchanges. In terms of market capitalisation, the BSE is rated the third largest stock exchange in Southern Africa.

With the new Depository and Settlement system, the BSE handles Equities found in Domestic, Foreign and Venture Boards, Corporate and Government Bonds and Commercial Paper. Meanwhile, Exchange Traded Products, Securitised Products and Derivatives are in the process of being introduced at the Exchange.

"This is yet another step towards our ambition of taking on a greater role in facilitating consolidation in worldwide financial markets," said Jit Seneviratne, Head of Business Development at MillenniumIT.

He added that the BSE has taken advantage of several recent feature enhancements to the Millennium CSD product such as Decentralised Deposits and Decentralized Client Registrations. This in turn will encourage the transfer secretaries and brokers to play an active role while reducing the data entry/clerical workload at the Exchange.

MillenniumIT has been contracted by the Lusaka Stock Exchange (LuSE) in Zambia to implement an integrated Central Securities Depository along with MillenniumITs automated trading platform, Millennium Exchange. Strengthened with this twinning programme, the LuSE is slated to go live on both systems simultaneously in November of this year.