Blogs

One of the major themes for 2023 is the emphasis on multi-asset trading and the focus on efficiency and scalability across regions and countries. In the past, a trader focused on a single asset class such as equities or bonds, whereas today with the migration to electronic trading, the desk can automate workflows and manage executions across all asset classes.

What are the top market structure issues for sell-side firms in 2023? With the new year off to a fast start, brokerage firms are facing a variety of evolving issues that could impact their trading businesses. On the horizon are proposed regulations to reform U.S. equity trading, increased best execution obligations, innovations in ATSs, 24-hour trading, and shortening the settlement cycle to T+1.

As we look back on this year, topics such as institutional adoption of digital asset trading, European trading in response to geopolitical risk, and the SEC’s plans to revamp U.S. stock trading rules dominated the headlines. In 2022, we covered those topics and much more including the growing sophistication of AlgoWheel, and the evolution of the buy-side fixed income EMS.

At the Security Traders Association (STA) 89th Annual National Market Structure Conference held in Washington DC in October, brokerage executives reacted to the concept of auctions as well as other ideas on SEC Chair Gary Gensler’s agenda to revamp equity market structure. But the industry’s top wholesalers and brokerage executives speaking at STA emphasized that the stock market is functioning well for retail investors and cautioned against making a litany of changes that could lead to worse results.

One of the biggest possible reforms would be a requirement for retail brokers to route individual orders to buy or sell stocks into a transparent “auction process” for matching customer orders, rather than sending them to wholesale market makers for execution on off-exchange platforms.

We covered topics such as retail order routing and the debate over payment for order flow (PFOF). We examined the resurgence in alternative trading systems (ATSs), the rise of outsourced trading desks for the buy side, and efforts to regulate fixed-income trading platforms as registered venues.

If PFOF is potentially curtailed or prohibited, it could impact retail investors that have benefited from commission-free trading as well as the wholesale market-maker model of matching retail orders through internalization.

The rise in off-exchange market share fueled by retail trading, liquidity aggregation on fixed-income trading desks, and how options traders adjusted to all-electronic trading during the pandemic were among the most popular topics. On the technology front, readers were drawn to the adoption of AI and machine learning by algo trading desks, ATSs and Algo Wheels.

Equity market participants are learning about new exchanges, order types, and periodic auctions bringing innovation and competition to the equity trading landscape. Citing the concept of “inaccessible liquidity,” asset managers pointed to the surge of retail trading by mom and pop investors whose orders are executed off-exchange on private platforms.  

As a sign of the evolving U.S. equity trading landscape, two startups and one options exchange operator plan to launch as many as three new exchange platforms in 2020, and a fourth could be waiting in the wings. Emphasizing the need for competition and innovation in US equity market structure, new entrants have downplayed the increased connectivity costs and additional fragmentation of orders across trading venues.