BATS Exchange, the US bourse operated by BATS Global Markets, has secured the first listings on its market with a series of new iShares exchange-traded funds (ETFs).
The rollout of the ETFs will begin on 24 January with the iShares MSCI Norway investable market index fund. Seven other ETFs, comprising iShares MSCI Australia small cap index fund, iShares MSCI Canada small cap index fund, iShares MSCI Finland capped investable market index fund, iShares MSCI Germany small cap index fund, iShares MSCI India index fund, iShares MSCI India small cap index fund, and the iShares MSCI United Kingdom small cap index fund, will be made available soon after.
“iShares is one of the leading global providers of exchange-traded products and we are proud to kick off the new year by welcoming their new products to our market. The innovation and leadership that iShares brings to capital markets makes them the perfect partner for our first primary listings,” said Joe Ratterman, chairman and CEO of BATS Global Markets. “iShares’ decision to list on BATS underscores the commitment that we are placing on ensuring our market is issuer-focused and concentrates on market quality.”
BATS opened up BZX, one of the two US stock exchanges it operates, for listings on 2 December. Its listings business will be underpinned by a competitive liquidity provider service, which will see market-makers compete for daily rewards by posting competitive quotes in a stock or exchange-traded products, based on their continuous daily quoted size at the national best bid/offer in registered securities. The programme is currently awaiting sign-off by the Securities and Exchange Commission. iShares is the ETF manager owned by asset management firm BlackRock.