ice traffic management policy. ice traffic management policy 20082 real-time ice traffic growth is...

ICE Traffic Management Policy

ICE Traffic Management policy 20082

Real-time ICE traffic growth is an industry-wide issue

Reasons for growth:• organic growth e.g., new instruments such as WTCL• market changes e.g., growth in algorithmic trading and machine-driven

quoting• technology changes e.g. introduction of high speed matching engines at

the exchange

The outcome: peak message per second traffic for ICE has grown by approximately 300% since August 2006.

Cost implications:

• escalating investment required in distribution networks, both for clients and Reuters

• requirement to build protection of client networks for traffic peaks • traffic peaks affecting user performance: speed of update rate for

human eyeballing, spreadsheets freezing


In response, Reuters has developed a new traffic management policy for ICE content

• Reuters is creating a traffic management (TM) policy for ICE on the Reuters Integrated Data Network (IDN). IDN is the network that feeds products such as Reuters 3000 Xtra and Reuters Trader for Commodities Advanced.

• The new traffic management policy

• covers ICE futures and spreads for root codes LCO, LGO, WTCL and LHO (no other energy market instruments are affected)

• is only activated at peak times, so network bandwidth is maximized at all times

• is designed to ensure a viable service for the real-time delivery of ICE content to desktops and desktop applications

• ensures all trade ticks are delivered


Details of ICE traffic management (TM) rules

• TM for ICE is applied only when traffic reaches pre-defined levels which are close to the maximum capacity of the Reuters IDN network

• Peak thresholds are defined for each ICE RIC and TM is applied only for the individual RICs which have exceeded their peak threshold

• When traffic for a given RIC is below peak threshold levels every single tick is broadcast. Network bandwidth utilisation is therefore optimized at all times

• When TM is applied, bid and ask quotes are “conflated” i.e., the most recent quote update is transmitted at the end of the conflation interval. The conflation interval for ICE will be set to one second

• Trade prices will not be subject to traffic management. Trade prices are distributed in absolute real-time. That will include the relevant bid and ask prices for that trade and any updates to daily high/low values generated by that trade

• ICE Futures content sets on the Bridge Data Network (BDN) and ex-Bridge products are not affected by this change


Client response to the traffic management policy

In discussions with desktop product clients to date, the new ICE TM policy has been viewed positively as Reuters is:

• helping clients manage their network costs (and indirectly their vendor costs)

• actively responding to a serious industry issue• delivering real-time ICE futures content appropriate for use in

desktops and desktop applications• helping end users process information at peak times• ensuring delivery of trades so that VWAP and tick charts are

unaffected when traffic management is activated • identifying that it is more important that at peak times those quotes

displayed are “current”, rather than every quote being displayed but running behind the market


Timeline for rollout of traffic management for ICE

• 13th February 2008: a Data Notification will be published to the Reuters Customer Zone and client IT managers informed via email distribution of announcement and explanatory documentation (see next slide for details of the documentation). In selected cases, pro-active calls from account management teams. This is a deliberate early distribution of information to the IT management of our clients to brief them on the change in advance of the broad-audience announcement

• 14th February 2008: general client and user base will be informed via email distribution of links to announcement and explanatory documentation, via commodities and energy community zone on Reuters.com, via <ALERT> page on Reuters IDN-fed products and via [ADVISORY] in the energy news file

• 1st April 2008: TM for ICE on IDN is scheduled to go live on IDN-fed products


Explanatory Documentation Available for Clients• All documents will be available from the Commodities and Energy

Community pages on the Reuters Customer Zone. In addition to this presentation file, the following documents will be made available:

• Short Summary Document in PDF format: this document is a high-level summary of the change and is intended for end-users of desktop products such as Reuters 3000 Xtra or Reuters Trader for Commodities Advanced

• Low-Level Explanatory Document in PDF Format: this is a detailed document, and will be made available by mid-February 2008. It will outline:

• the historical context behind the change in terms of update rates

• worked examples of traffic management at a field by field level

• descriptions of the implications for other Reuters products and delivery infrastructures, e.g. Reuters IDN Full Tick (RDF+)


Further Questions

• Further questions should be raised either to your Reuters account management team or to the Reuters Service Centre.

ice traffic management policy. ice traffic management policy 20082 real-time ice traffic growth is...

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