SEC
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SEC Revives Payment for Order Flow Debate
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.
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Regulating Fixed-Income Platforms: Separating Fact from Fiction
The fixed-income trading space has exploded with innovation from electronic trading protocols to new pricing services. In recent years, execution management systems (EMSs) have expanded their functionality in fixed income to provide more efficiency and …
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CAT Compliance Ramps Up on Sell Side with Interfirm Linkages
While adhering to the CAT reporting timeline, sell-side firms are responsible for monitoring the CAT Reporter Portal and for fixing errors and rejects that come back from FINRA. So far, experts say the industry is doing very well with their data submissions. But error rates could escalate as the industry tackles more thorny order events and submits higher volumes of data.
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Reforming the SIP with Odd Lots and Competing Consolidators
With attention riveted on volatile stock and bond markets and the economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, brokers and asset managers are focused on keeping up with the high volumes of market data and trades. With so many unknowns, the situation could impact market data reforms to overhaul the securities information processor or SIP.
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Exchange Landscape Gearing Up for Expansion in 2020
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.
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U.S. to Study Effects of MiFID II Research Unbundling
U.S. lawmakers authorized a study focusing on the provision of investment research for small issuers, a sign they are wary of the U.S. adopting the European Union’s MIFID II unbundling rules which have brought sweeping changes to the research business.
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CAT: Moving the Ball Forward
With a new contractor taking over the Consolidated Audit Trail project in March, the order-tracking system for all U.S. stock and option trading activity is pushing ahead with equities testing starting in December and a go-live date of April 2020.
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CAT is Out of the Bag
Despite a one-year delay and other missed deadlines, the order-tracking system known as the Consolidated Audit Trail is back on track as exchanges were due to begin reporting required equities and options data into the CAT on Nov. 15.
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SEC Steers Pilot on Equity Trading Fees and Rebates Amid Headwinds
Diving into one of the more controversial issues in equity market structure, U.S. regulators are moving forward with the transaction-fee pilot that will force stock exchanges to lower the fee caps on rebates they pay to brokers and market makers.
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Fixed Income Trading Protocols: Going with the Flow
As the SEC turns to examine market structure issues in the bond markets, it comes at a time when there has been a flurry of new electronic trading venues entering with a range of protocols. FlexTrade’s Ivy Schmerken investigates.
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Order Protection Rule Tug-of-War
by Ivy Schmerken, Editorial Director There is still uncertainty around the fate of the Order Protection Rule, a key rule governing U.S. stock trading that has led to more complexity, speed and order types, but …
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Is the Maker-Taker Pilot DOA?
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.