Patent ID: 7024386

Claim:
An anonymous trading system for trading instruments between trading parties; comprising: a communications network for transmitting electronic messages; a plurality of order input devices connected to the communications network each for generating electronic orders including bid and/or offer orders and for communicating to a trader order information received from others of said plurality of order input devices over the network; at least one matching engine connected to the network for matching bid and offer orders input into the system from the order input devices and for executing deals where prices are matched; a market distributor connected to the network for distributing order price messages to the trader terminals, the market distributor being responsive to the order messages and the matching engine; a credit limit store for storing credit available for trades between each trader or group of traders and possible counterparty traders or groups of traders; and a credit adjuster for adjusting the credit available for future trades between a given party and a counterparty following a trade with that counterparty, the credit adjustment means calculating the change in exposure to the party resulting from the trade and adjusting the credit available in accordance with the change in exposure that results from a netting of trades between a given party and each counterparty.