15 May 2025
Eurex
Eurex Repo Monthly News April 2025
Market briefing: ''Term volumes show mixed signals: Strong growth in GC Pooling and decline in Term Special Repo''
by Frank Gast and Carsten Hiller, Eurex Repo
In April 2025, the market continued to build on the recovery that began in March. As the new quarter commenced, there was lively term trading, particularly out to various netting dates within the next three months. With €STR swap rates fluctuating significantly during the month, especially in the first half of April, there were increased opportunities for longer-term trading, particularly in the GC Pooling segment.
On 17 April, the ECB delivered its latest EUR policy rate cut of 25 basis points, as widely anticipated and priced in the market. The new rates, effective from 23 April, had an immediate impact, particularly on short-term trading volumes in GC Pooling.
Traded Volumes
Compared to April 2024, average daily traded volumes grew by 12.2% in April 2025 which was due to a strong rise in GC Pooling which showed a substantial increase of 35.6%. The GC Repo & Special repo segment in contrast declined by 14.9%.
However for term-adjusted volumes (TAV) April saw a 14 percent decline in daily volumes to EUR 377.4 billion, compared to April 2024’s peak of EUR 440.1 billion, due to less demand in special term repo. GC Pooling still recorded an increase by this measurement albeit more modestly of 8.7% while the Specials / GC Repo segment fell by 31.6%. This clearly suggests that the growth in traded volume recorded in April has been in short term dates compared to last year.
Nevertheless, daily term-adjusted volume was up 18 percent compared to the previous month’s volume in March, driven by a 37.6 percent increase of term business in GC Pooling.
Assessing year on year comparison, year-to-date average daily traded volume as at end of April is almost unchanged compared to same period 2024 with a slight rise of 1.1%. This breaks down to reveal a growth of 11.9% in GC Pooling and a drop of 12.5% in Specials / GC Repo.
Spreads and Collateral
The spread between the ECB and EXT ECB basket overnight rates was consistent in April, averaging just 0.875 basis points for the month. The GC Pooling ECB basket rate remained closely aligned with the deposit rate throughout the month, trading within one basis point below DFR until the final week of the month when rates fell a further one basis point and the average traded overnight rate on the last day of the month lowered to 2.214%, showing only a minor drop from usual market rates.
The STOXX GC Pooling Funding Rate Volume for April, which aggregates all Overnight, TomNext and SpotNext traded volumes from the order book in the ECB and EXT ECB baskets, averaged EUR 22.3 billion per day which was unchanged from March. The average traded volume by this metric however sharply increased in the second half of April, after the ECB rate cut was announced, to EUR 27.1 billion per day.
GC & Specials
Some Bubills continued to trade at levels around €STR minus 130 - 140 basis points, continuing a trend that has lasted several weeks. Otherwise, little spread was observed overall with a distinct lack of specialism in the EUR market currently.
In the Specials market, significant demand was again observed for Euro government bonds, particularly for term dates ranging from one month to September and usually involving netting dates.
Bund Special repo volumes continued to recover, with an increase in daily traded volumes by 1.5% compared to March and an 11% increase compared to Q1 2025.
In the GC Repo segment, we observed another rise in high-volume trading, similar to what was seen in March. Italian 10-year government bonds were particularly active in one-day terms, while Spanish 10-year government bonds experienced comparable liquidity for trading terms ranging from one week to three months. SSA bonds were frequently traded from the order book in GC format as well. However, the majority of SSAs are still traded in the Special market, with volumes up to five times higher.
EU Bonds continued to be highly traded, maintaining volumes above EUR 20bn for the third consecutive month and with 2.5 times higher traded volumes compared to April 2024.
GC Pooling
GC Pooling remained the main growth driver in April, with daily term adjusted volumes rising 8.7% compared to April 24. Term activity was particularly animated with swap rates moving dynamically throughout the month which led to a significant traded volume of long-term trades from 6 months to two years duration with order book opportunities in both the ECB and EXT ECB baskets. For trades of 12 months and beyond it was notable that use of our break date trade type was commonplace, sometimes deployed in monthly breaks, sometimes in quarterly breaks.
It was also good to see the recovery of the Green Bond GC Pooling basket which regained its’ former liquidity after missing some liquidity during March. The basket was traded almost daily as April progressed and weekly volumes were between EUR 1 – 2 billion in terms ranging from overnight to one week maturity and on average trading around one basis point below the ECB GC Pooling basket.
Events - save the date
ISLA Madrid
📍 Hotel Puerta America | 17-19 June 2025
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Participants: 167
