Opinion

Increased transparency could help Europe turn green shoots into blossoming trees

Record €104 billion daily trading volumes suggest European equities are entering a new phase of sustained participation. Converting this momentum into global competitiveness will depend on closing transparency gaps, reducing reporting noise and modernising fragmented post-trade infrastructure across the region, writes Nicholas Phillips, market structure research analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence (BI).
By Nicholas Phillips

After several years of muted growth, European equity markets look like they’re at an inflection point. The momentum we saw in 2025 which pushed trade volumes to historical highs – has surged into 2026. For the first two months of this year, average daily value traded hit a record €104 billion for the first two months of the year, a 24% increase year-over-year, with record months for both January and February.

This strength suggests a fundamental shift away from volatility-driven trading toward consistent participation, signalling a broader asset-allocation toward Europe. It also provides a unique window of opportunity to transform this momentum into a resilient, world-class equity ecosystem.

By increasing transparency, reducing Europe’s opaqueness and transforming Europe’s post-trade infrastructure can help achieve this.

The transparency gap

To cement these gains, Europe addressing its transparency deficit is key. The upcoming consolidated tapes by both the EU and UK provide a foundation but long-term scalability could benefit from greater transparency for the region beyond the tapes. While the region is aggressively courting retail participation, the true scale of this activity remains siloed within individual exchanges.

Europe could implement changes similar to US SEC Rules 605 and 606, which require broker-dealers to publicly disclose execution quality and order routing data. Even when specific trades appear opaque, these mandates ensure that the broader market can hold participants accountable. While the US model democratises data to provide a clear view of market health, Europe’s lack of standardised public reporting keeps these insights out of reach. Bridging this gap would be essential for Europe to validate its growth and build a truly competitive marketplace.

While any potential adoption of US – SEC 605 and 606 style reporting would be a long-term objective and require significant change, in the short term, the EU could consider introducing a closing price flag harmonised with UK standards to clearly distinguish prints executed outside the primary closing auction.

Furthermore, transparency would be greatly enhanced by eliminating duplicate reporting between EU and UK jurisdictions and stripping out non-price-forming, off-book trades used solely for clearing. By removing this technical ‘noise’ the region can provide a higher-fidelity view of true liquidity, offering a cleaner data landscape while more comprehensive disclosure frameworks are developed. Equity ‘back to back swap’ activity is another area where greater transparency could be brought to the wider market.

Addressing the infrastructure friction

The European Commission’s push for a more harmonised landscape marks a significant step toward modernising Europe’s post-trade infrastructure. While trading itself is fragmented, the settlement layer is even more so, now burdened by 17 central clearing counterparties and 28 central securities depositories (CSDs).

Streamlining this environment could be critical to cutting friction and lowering costs. A centralised settlement framework would save investors money by eliminating the need to shift funds across multiple CSDs. However, achieving this Capital Markets Union vision faces a steep political climb. Member states may resist losing national CSDs in favour of a harmonised approach, making any negotiations between the Commission, parliament, and member states a decisive moment for European market efficiency.

Europe’s window of opportunity

It’s has been a long time since Europe has seen this kind of activity in its equity markets. To help keep and pull more global investors should use this momentum to deliver a world-class marketplace defined by clear transparent data and frictionless settlement and transform recent gains into a permanent, long-term magnet for global capital.

EU market integration package must focus on real bottlenecks

As policymakers debate reforms under the Market Integration Package, the priority should be preserving competition and innovation while tackling genuine structural weaknesses - particularly market data costs and inefficient post-trade infrastructure across Europe, writes Pete Tomlinson, managing director of equities trading and post-trade at the Association for Financial Markets in Europe (AFME).

Extended hours are coming of age – and the market needs to catch up

Extended-hours trading in US equities is rapidly moving from niche to necessity. With pre- and post-market volumes approaching 9% of daily activity and overseas demand surging - particularly across Asia - the overnight session is evolving into a structural feature of global equity markets, writes Jason Wallach, chief executive, Bruce Markets.

Europe’s move from OTC to listed markets

Jon Light, senior director of product management at Devexperts, explores the trend of CFD brokers across Europe moving to a multi-asset model, from why regulations are changing, to the importance of business model transparency, the role of neobanks and the evolution of traders themselves.

Fixed income in focus: How automation and tokenisation are reshaping markets

As fixed income post-trade operations enter a pivotal transformation phase, Jon Hodges, head of trading and asset services, APAC at FIS, analyses how regulatory shifts, T+1 settlement pressures, automation advances, and tokenisation are driving firms to replace costly legacy systems with real-time, integrated platforms.

Hedge funds need a clearer operational reality

Stefan Schmaltz, managing director, quantitative analytics at Clearwater Analytics highlights the need for hedge funds to have real-time front-to-back technology platforms to manage risk, compliance, and faster settlement effectively, as fragmented systems and manual processes create dangerous delays and operational vulnerabilities in today’s volatile, fast-moving markets.

Collateral is falling behind risk and markets are paying the price

With time becoming one of the most expensive frictions in finance, David Mercer, chief executive of LMAX Group, explores how delayed settlement and limited mobility are undermining capital efficiency, and why continuous 24/7 collateral movement is becoming the next frontier of market structure.

Japan’s long-dated JGB moves are a warning for margin risk

Yutaka Imanishi, head of OSTTRA Japan, explores how sharp Japanese government bonds repricing can impact derivatives, margin and collateral flows, amplifying volatility and liquidity stress irrespective of the political backdrop.

24/7 trading a reality in 2026? Actually, it’s already here

With 24-hour trading quickly becoming a reality across financial markets, John Shammas, chief growth officer of DriveWealth explores how this is reshaping investor behaviour, technology demands and regulatory priorities, and how the industry can tackle the challenge of delivering continuous trading efficiently and effectively.

Stable isn’t just a peg – it’s a production standard

Akbar Thobhani, chief executive of sFOX, examines why stablecoin adoption will occur not at the design layer, but in production, where execution quality, risk controls and liquidity discipline define what “stable” truly means.