The European Commission last week released proposals for the second iteration of its Markets in Financial Instruments Directive, which shook up equities trading in Europe, prompted the creation of new multilateral trading facilities, and caused trading to fragment, creating a wealth of new data and demands for a US-style consolidated tape to re-aggregate this fragmented data.

Not surprising, though, is that MiFID 2 will extend to asset classes beyond equities, and contribute to the forces driving bonds and derivatives onto exchanges or centrally-cleared, exchange-like platforms, such as European bond trading platform the Galaxy MTF, which recently received approval to operate as an exchange from the Swiss regulator. It’s also not surprising that more venues would want to trade fixed income assets: Third quarter turnover in Börse Berlin’s bonds trading segment increased by 183 percent over Q3 last year.

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Inside Market Data - Max Bowie - October 24, 2011