Icap, formerly Garban Intercapital, is gearing up to be one of the single biggest investors in technology to support the swaps market. There are several projects under way, all poised to take advantage of electronic pricing and trading technology, and to ensure that if the swaps market does follow the equity and fixed-income markets into going electronic, Icap is prepared.

Initially, the interdealer broker watched, and took a small stake in, Blackbird, a US derivatives software firm which has built an electronic trading platform to enable swaps dealers to trade directly with each other.