Calculation Agent

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Calculation Agent
/ˌkælkjʊˈleɪʃən ˈeɪʤənt/ (n.)
One who calculates things on behalf of contracting counterparties. In theory, under any kind of finance contract, but in practice, mainly in the ISDA and its extended fan-fiction universe (GMSLA, GMRA, DRV, FBF etc), and in the documentation of debt securities.

To be endlessly compared and contrasted with a “determination agent”, who determines things on behalf of contracting counterparties. Do “calculation” and “determination” differ? Not as far as this correspondent can see. You tend to say, perversely, that a Calculation Agent determines things, and a Determination Agent calculates things, but largely because elegant prose has a horror of repetition. But will that stop over-enthusiastic members of the bar waxing lengthily about how they do differ? it will not.

In the ISDA

The ISDA Schedule has space to specify who the Calculation Agent should be but, curiously, gives scant hints as to what such an agent should do: the term isn’t otherwised defined — or even used — in either version of the ISDA Master Agreement. The role comes in to its own under the 1995 CSA and the various definitions booklets ISDA has published. The Calculation agent can differ from transaction to transaction, and while guileless negotiation teams may therefore spend a great deal of energy haggling fruitlessly about who should be the Calculation Agent, and what rights the other poor sap should have to challenge its determinations, in practice it will be the dealer.

How strongly each feels about its right to query or dispute the Calculation Agent’s determinations will depend on the sort of products they’re expecting to trade: FX and simple equity derivatives have deep, liquid, observable markets, and as there’s little scope for picking a fight, a dealer Calculation Agent may not be bothered about ceding rights to dispute its calculations. Expect a different reaction should you seek to second-guess your dealer’s marks on exotic credit derivatives, on the other hand. These rely enormously on the dealer’s internal models, pricing curves and other kinds of idiosyncratic financial alchemy that are almost certainly unique to the dealer in question.

Co-calculation agent

There’s an old saying:

A co-calculation agent is no calculation agent.

However superficially neat this might seem to the age-old valuation dilemma of who should price the trade, it suffers in one important respect: unless the parties agree on the determination, the parties — er — won't agree on the determination. And then what do you do?

Other ISDA booklets

The term is defined separately in each definition booklet:

• In the 2002 ISDA Equity Derivatives Definitions at Section 1.40;
• In the 2006 ISDA Fund Derivatives Definitions (in virtually identical terms to the 2002 ISDA Equity Derivatives Definitions) at Section 1.27;
• In the 2005 ISDA Commodity Definitions at greater length in Section 4.5;

See also

• Determining Party

References

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As its name suggests, a calculation agent is a person appointed to calculate things, usually in the context of a master trading agreement like an ISDA Master Agreement, a Global Master Repurchase Agreement, a 2010 GMSLA or a 1995 CSA or other credit support document. It will usually be one of the parties to the master agreement, and usually the broker dealer out of the two, if there is only one.

But just who the calculation agent is, and how much discretion it has to determine the calculation without entertaining protest from the other party, is a matter that can occupy a derivatives lawyer for days on end.

Spoiler: appointing each party as a co-calculation agent won’t work.