Profits at MTS could be wiped out by interest payments on a loan put in place by eSpeed, the US bond platform, to back its bid for the pan-European electronic bond-trading platform.

ESpeed, which is vying with a consortium comprising Euronext and Borsa Italiana for control of MTS, has put in place a $60m (€50m) one-year drawdown loan from Cantor Fitzgerald, its parent company, to help fund its bid. It can draw on the loan from September.