Officials at the IntercontinentalExchange Inc. (ICE) confirmed this week that the antitrust division of the U.S. Department of Justice is also examining part of its business plan for clearing credit-default swaps, adding to pending approvals from other federal regulators.

Specifically, the DOJ is probing ICE's pending acquisition of the Clearing Corp., an independent clearinghouse owned by large derivatives dealers. ICE first submitted details of the acquisition to the DOJ about three months ago. Under federal law, acquisitions of a certain size must receive approval from federal antitrust regulators. A spokeswoman for the DOJ refused to provide details, except to say the department is "aware" of the ICE's pending acquisition, but ICE officials noted that the DOJ's probe is a routine review.

"A review would apply in most M&A situations," said Sarah Stashak, an ICE spokeswoman, noting that the DOJ review would still apply even if the acquisition wasn't tied to the credit-default swap clearing plan.

Still, the need for DOJ approval of the Clearing Corp. acquisition represents another hurdle that ICE must overcome as it seeks to clear trades in the $32 trillion credit-default swap market.

The exchange has been unable to start clearing credit-default swaps because it is still awaiting approvals from the New York Federal Reserve and the Securities and Exchange Commission. Under ICE's plan, it intends to form a limited purpose bank called ICE US Trust, which would make it subject to Fed oversight.

Two rival companies, meanwhile, are also looking to offer credit-default swap clearing platforms in the U.S., but under different primary regulators. Those include proposals by CME Group Inc. (CME) and a joint effort between NYSE Euronext (NYX) and LCH.Clearnet.

Federal regulators pledged in November to grant approvals to one or more of the three U.S.-based credit-default swap clearing proposals before Dec. 31, but so far, only LCH.Clearnet has received a green light.

ICE officials said the exchange expects approval on both its acquisition of Clearing Corp. and its planned credit-default swap clearinghouse in a matter of weeks.

Part of the delay, ICE said, is that its original clearing plan submitted to the Fed didn't incorporate the Clearing Corp. deal, which had yet to be announced. That acquisition, however, will allow the company to offer a global clearing solution for credit derivatives, even though it has also made the federal approval process a tad more complex.

-By Sarah N. Lynch and Jacob Bunge, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-6634; sarah.lynch@dowjones.com.

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