SIX Financial Information enhances Evaluated Pricing Service with auction rate securities valuations from Pluris

Zurich (Switzerland) - Since the collapse of the auction rate securities market in the US in 2008, holders of these now illiquid instruments have struggled to find reliable secondary market quotes and price clarity. Now, with best-of-breed evaluated pricing from Pluris Valuation Advisors LLC, SIX Financial Information’s clients can value their auction rate securities with confidence. While SIX Financial Information has offered evaluated pricing for a wide range of OTC derivative, fixed income, and illiquid instruments for many years, auction rate securities (ARS) have proved to be a particularly difficult class of assets to value. With Pluris’ extensive database covering thousands of recent transactions and its relationship with SecondMarket, which is currently the only active auction rate trading venue, Pluris is able to provide an additional element of certainty in their evaluated prices far beyond what other providers can deliver. “Many factors should be considered in any evaluation, but recent transactions of similar assets are especially relevant,” said Bob Sangha, Senior Product Manager, Evaluated Pricing at SIX Financial Information. “Because Pluris is focused on the ARS market, they have a broad database of recent sales and quotes available for use in their evaluations. This critical element gives a great deal of credibility to their results, and we are pleased to be able to offer this dependable and established service to our customers.” The Pluris auction rate pricing available through SIX covers municipal, student loan and preferreds. It is integrated with SIX Financial Information’s own proprietary evaluations for fixed income, interest rates, FX, credit, equity and commodity instruments, which includes valuations from other leading third parties. Rounding out the service is SIX Financial Information’s wealth of security master data for the ARS universe as well as millions of other globally traded equity, fixed income and derivative instruments. “Our focus is primarily on collecting the most robust input data for our models and providing the highest quality, most accurate valuations possible for auction rate securities,” said Espen Robak CFA, President of Pluris. “So to be able to distribute our service alongside SIX Financial Information’s own best in class evaluated pricing through their extensive, global network of offices is a tremendous advantage. We especially look forward to working with SIX as their values of service and quality are closely aligned with our own.” About SIX Financial Information SIX Financial Information is a leading global provider of data services and solutions for financial and insurance firms, corporations and the media. Aggregated in real-time from over 1,500 worldwide sources, SIX’s financial information is comprised of corporate actions, pricing, reference and market data for over 12 million instruments and is unique in terms of information depth, breadth and structure. With offices in 23 countries, SIX combines the advantages of local expertise with global reach to offer comprehensive data services for investment advisory, portfolio management, financial analysis and securities administration professionals. Financial Information is one of four business areas of SIX which offers global premium services in securities trading, clearing and settlement, payment transactions, and financial information. Further information is available at: www.six-financial-information.com. About Pluris Pluris Valuation Advisors LLC (www.pluris.com) is a full-service national valuation firm, specializing in business valuations and valuations of hard-to-value, illiquid, and distressed securities. Pluris is known for its empirical research and proprietary databases on valuation discounts. Pluris clients include global banks and institutions, investment funds, public and private companies, and high-net-worth individuals that require valuations for estate tax, gift tax, or income tax purposes. *     *     *     * Pluris Valuation Advisors LLC (www.pluris.com) is a full-service national valuation firm, specializing in business valuations and valuations of hard-to-value, illiquid and distressed securities. Pluris is known for its empirical research and proprietary databases on valuation discounts. Pluris clients include global banks and institutions, investment funds, public and private companies, and high-net-worth individuals that require valuations for estate tax, gift tax or income tax purposes.