Foundation and early years Markit was founded in 2003 by Canadian
Lance Uggla in
St Albans, outside London, as Mark-it Partners to provide daily
credit default swap (CDS) pricing. Markit's
credit derivative data sales rose during the
subprime mortgage crisis in 2007 and later years. In September 2009, Markit and
Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC) launched MarkitSERV, a
joint venture to provide
over-the-counter (OTC) derivative trade processing.
Acquisitions 2004 - 2009 Totem Valuations, a supplier of consensus valuations and month-end data, was bought by Markit in May 2004. The International Index Company (IIC) and CDS Index Company (CDSIndexCo), owners of the
iTraxx and CDX
credit default swap indexes, were acquired by Markit in November 2007. In December 2007, Markit announced the acquisition of SwapsWire. The BOAT,
Markets in Financial Instruments Directive-compliant trade reporting platform acquired by Markit from a
consortium of nine
investment banks In January 2008. The BOAT was owned by
consortium of nine
investment banks —
ABN Amro,
Citigroup,
Credit Suisse,
Deutsche Bank,
Goldman Sachs,
HSBC,
Merrill Lynch,
Morgan Stanley and
UBS who had launched the system in September 2006. The Boat platform was established by these nine banks "for the collection and sale of trading data following the introduction of EU's Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID) in November 2007.
JPMorgan Chase's FCS Corporation, a provider of syndicated loan market
portfolio and
risk management software and services, including the Wall Street Office family of products, was acquired by Markit in July 2008.
Fidelity Information Services's ClearPar, an electronic
loan-trade-processing platform, was acquired by Markit in October 2009 which helped Markit to work with DTCC to improve the processing of
syndicated loans.
Public listing and growth In 2013,
Temasek Holdings bought 10% of shares for $500 million, thereby valuing the company at $5 bn. By 2012, the company had annual revenues of US$860 million, with over 3,000 employees and had a $5 billion valuation. The stock began trading on 19 June 2014 with an initial pricing of $24 per share.
Merger On 12 July 2016, Markit and
IHS Inc. merged in an all-stock merger of equals to form
IHS Markit. ==Index products==