Matif Plans '98 Euro Launch

Girard Pfauwadel, head of the Matif, on Tuesday stressed the importance of developing new euro interest rate products for his organisation, partly in view of the breakdown of co-operation talks with his German counterparts.

In an interview with the French newspaper Agefi, he said Paris's strength lay in building on its trading in interest rate products and that a theoretical euro contract could be set up during 1998 once the list of countries to be included in Emu and their exchange rate for entry into the single currency were known.

His comments came after the Deutsche Bvrse, representing the merged Frankfurt stock and derivatives exchanges, formally confirmed last week that long-running discussions about joint projects with the French financial markets had been abandoned.

Pfauwadel said the collapse of the talks was the result of the German diktat that electronic trading