Blogs

With a new head of trading and markets at the SEC, there is some optimism that some of the complex market structure issues – such as make-taker incentives and sky-high market data costs — will be looked at in 2018. FlexTrade’s Ivy Schmerken covers the key takeaways on what matters to buy-side and sell-side traders, as discussed at Traders’ Magazine’s Nov. 7 Second Inaugural Market Structure Equity Town Hall.

After more than a decade of debate, regulators are poised to act on a pilot for maker-or-taker pricing, a practice whereby market makers are paid a rebate to add liquidity and are charged a fee to remove liquidity by electronic trading venues. FlexTrade’s Ivy Schmerken investigates.

Buy side firms have shown signs of impatience with U.S. equity market structure. While they are leery of radical reforms, institutions have seeded a number of trading venues lately.

Buy side traders debating the pros and cons of the U.S. equity market structure recently gave high marks to the computerized stock trading landscape, though it didn’t take long for concerns to surface.

Proposed changes in market structure that have been advanced by two of the three biggest U.S. equity-exchange operators, such as reducing access fees and implementing a trade-at rule, represent a positive step in promoting competition and transparency, according to Jamie Benincasa, senior vice president, equities at trading-technology provider FlexTrade.