MUMBAI, Aug 1 (Reuters) - Electronic trading service

provider MarketAxess ( MKTX ) is aiming to ease foreign investor access

to India's government bond market with its new trading platform,

as local debt continues to get added to global indexes.

Earlier this week, the first trade on the platform was

executed between BlackRock ( BLK ) and Standard Chartered Bank ( SCBFF ) (India),

MarketAxess ( MKTX ) said. The platform is integrated with the Clearing

Corporation of India's NDS-Order Matching system, enabling

foreign investors to place bids and offers directly.

"I am very optimistic about the adoption of electronic

trading as it solves operational inefficiencies that investors

face," said Riad Chowdhury, head of Asia-Pacific at MarketAxess ( MKTX )

said on Friday.

Reducing the size of funds they need to maintain in

custodial bank accounts and automating trade-related processes

could draw more foreign investors to using the tool, as index

inclusions keep Indian debt on the radar, investors said.

"The goal is to onboard all our clients who are able to

trade Indian government bonds on our platform." said Chowdhury,

adding that there is optimism this may happen in the next 6-12

months.

The firm has more than 1,400 global emerging market

institutional investors among its clients including asset

managers, hedge funds, central banks and sovereign wealth funds.

Indian government bonds were added to JPMorgan's emerging

market debt index over a year ago and to Bloomberg's Emerging

Market Local Currency Index at the start of 2025. They are also

set to be included in the FTSE Russell index from September.

Over the past 13 months, since being added to JPMorgan's EM

debt index, overseas investors have net purchased nearly 1

trillion Indian rupees ($11.43 billion) of bonds.

($1 = 87.4690 Indian rupees)