Telerate Inc yesterday announced the launch of the UK Gilt version of Tactician. The system combines real time prices direct from UK gilt market makers and LIFFE – London International Financial Futures Exchange – with a five year database from the Bank of England and a series of analysis programs. Programs cover cash, futures and options markets, including spreads, basis, swaps, horizon, technical and statistical analysis as well as yield curve studies and position valuations. The original product was developed by Giltnet Ltd, a subsidiary of Australian Gilt Securities Ltd, who are marketing the system in the UK in conjunction with Telerate. Tactician runs under MS-DOS on Telerate’s own 80286-based machine, and is offered rental only at an entry price of $1,200 per month, rising to $1,800 for the top of the range system. Telerate says the service will initially be available only on its own equipment as it would be a major development to integrate it with other systems. The product is available in Australia, the US and the UK and will shortly be customised for the Japanese and German markets. The UK release follows on Telerate’s announcement in New York last week of Matrix, another MS-DOS-based information service which offers instantly-accessible configurable pages. Initially Matrix will concentrate on mortgage-backed securities, however the company says other specialised data packages will be available later this year. The mortgage-backed data includes live market prices, yields, daily highs and lows and live spreads-to-benchmark treasury issues. Users have the option of using Telerate hardware or their own micros and they can choose the data delivery method – satellite, FM sideband or telephone network. Telerate says that its future plans include the addition of graphic and numerical analysis capabilities. Telerate Inc is a stand-alone financial information services company based in New York; it is majority-owned by Dow Jones & Co.
