The Portuguese Treasury and Debt Agency has selected ICAP's electronic fixed-income trading platform BrokerTec as a recognised trading system that fulfils its criteria for the wholesale trading of government bonds in Portugal. Portugal is the seventh EU government to open its wholesale bond markets to competitive trading platforms since 2008.

Maria Luís Albuquerque, head of issuing and markets at the Portuguese Treasury and Government Debt Agency said: "The Portuguese sovereign debt market is mature, and the circumstances that determined the choice of a single platform in the past have clearly changed. We believe that giving Primary Dealers the choice on where to comply with market making obligations will ultimately increase the efficiency of the wholesale secondary market, and therefore the liquidity of our bonds and bills."

John Edwards, head of fixed income sales for ICAP Electronic Broking, said: "We are delighted that the Portuguese Debt Agency has joined the six other European markets in opening its government bond markets to a competitive, multiplatform set-up. In times of such high volatility, the benefits offered by a centrally cleared model such as BrokerTec is of great value to the dealer community. This, coupled with the competitive initiative to deliver further efficiencies, will increase innovation in this sector of the government bond market."