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Northern Trust Picks Markit For Derivatives Valuations

London and New York – Markit Group Limited (“Markit”), the leading industry source of independent data, portfolio valuations and OTC derivative trade processing for the global financial and commodities markets, today announced that Northern Trust, a leading provider of investment management, fiduciary and banking solutions, has selected Markit as the preferred provider of OTC derivative valuations.

Markit’s portfolio valuations service is aimed at mutual funds, hedge funds, traditional asset managers, fund administrators, custodians and banks. The service was launched in response to strong client demand and it addresses growing concerns among investors and regulators over the lack of accurate, independent valuations for complex, illiquid instruments.

This is a bespoke service that provides critical, independent post-trade calculation of the gross asset value of a portfolio of OTC derivative trades. Valuations are provided for both vanilla and exotic instruments, and the service is calibrated with Markit’s proprietary data, received from over 75 leading market makers. The ability to refer to these prices, which span over one million data points collected daily, sets Markit apart from alternative services.

Michael Muller, Senior Business Process Analyst at Northern Trust in Chicago, said: “Markit has been valuing our swaps for over a year now. Because of Markit’s extensive global support and market coverage across many currencies, we have decided to make them our primary valuations provider for OTC derivatives, and will roll out their valuations across asset classes over the coming months.”

Tim Barker, Executive Vice President and Head of Valuations at Markit, added: “We are pleased to have been chosen by Northern Trust to provide independent valuations for OTC derivatives and other complex instruments. As the focus of regulators and investors sharpens on fund valuations, we are seeing increasing demand for our service and we look forward to working with Northern Trust to meet their clients’ needs.”

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For further information, please contact:

Markit

Teresa Chick

Director, Corporate Communications

Tel: +44 20 7260 2094

Email: teresa.chick@markit.com

About Markit

Markit Group Limited is the leading provider of independent data, portfolio valuations and OTC derivatives trade processing to the global financial and commodities markets. The company receives daily data contributions from over 75 dealing firms, and its services are used by almost 1,000 institutions to enhance trading operations, reduce risk and manage compliance.

Markit’s position in the derivatives markets has been acknowledged by the industry with numerous awards. In 2006, the company won Operations Management’s Vendor of the Year award (Trade Processing); Financial News’ Best Derivatives Data Solution and Best New Vendor Solution (Portfolio Valuations); Credit’s Best Operational Support Services Provider; Inside Market Data’s Reference Data Provider of the Year, and Company to Watch; Risk’s Trading Initiative of the Year (Credit Event Fixings); and Structured Finance International’s Editor’s Award for Advancing Structured Finance. In 2005, Markit received International Securitisation Report’s Editor’s Award for Innovation; International Financing Review’s Innovation of the Year (Credit Event Fixings); Financial News’ Best Derivatives Data Provider; and Operations Management’s Vendor of the Year award.