European equity trading rally continues – Thomson Reuters

Trading activity in Europe’s equity markets continued to pick up in April, with total turnover across exchanges and multilateral trading facilities increasing 15.6% to €1.31 trillion, according the latest market share report from data provider Thomson Reuters.
By None

Trading in Europe’s equity markets continued to rally in April, with total turnover across exchanges and multilateral trading facilities increasing 15.6% to €1.31 trillion, according the latest market share report from data provider Thomson Reuters.

This follows an 11% increase in total turnover in March compared with February. Volume traded also rose for the second month in a row to 202 billion shares, a 6% increase on March’s volume.

The month-on-month increases were experienced across the board. Turnover at the London Stock Exchange group increased to over €295 million in April from €238 million in March. Likewise, MTF Chi-X Europe’s turnover increased to €56 million from €45 million in March.

However, the collective market share of the displayed multilateral trading facilities tracked by Reuters – Chi-X Europe, Turquoise, BATS Europe and Nasdaq OMX Europe – fell to 6.93% of the value traded in Europe in April from 7.73% in March. Chi-X remained the biggest MTF, accounting for 4.92% of pan-European trading, a 0.03 percentage-point decline on its March market share.

Euronext’s value market share also experienced a sharp drop to 9.78% from 11.30% in March.

The main beneficiary appears to be the over-the-counter (OTC) market. OTC trade reporting venue Markit BOAT’s share of the value traded in Europe grew to 27.04% from 23.35% in March. OTC trades reported to Euronext – Europe’s biggest OTC reporting venue after BOAT – increased to 7.04% of the value traded in Europe in April from 6.34% in March.

Since March, the monthly Thomson Reuters figures have included trades reported after the actual date of the trade. The report now also separates out over-the-counter (OTC) trades reported by national exchanges, which includes both delayed trades and those reported to an exchange but executed elsewhere, typically on a broker’s systematic internalisation engine or another trading venue.

MiFID allows total freedom in choice of reporting venue and permits brokers to delay the reporting of trades for up to three days depending on the average daily turnover of a particular stock. For example, stocks with an average daily turnover (ADT) of between €100,000 and €50,000,000 can be delayed until the end of the third trading day after execution, as long as the transaction represents 250% or over of the ADT.

«