EU market participants say poorly-worded rules undermine some key objectives
Institutional investors are increasingly trading in blocks of shares too large to be caught by
Mifid’s dark pool restrictions. SIs, meanwhile, now account for about one-fifth of the market, up
from less than 2 per cent in 2017, according to Rosenblatt Securities. The market share of
exchanges has fallen from about 45 per cent pre-Mifid II to about 37 per cent today, the broker
estimated.
“It’s the opposite of what European policymakers intended,” said Anish Puaar, European
market structure analyst at Rosenblatt. Even though alternative venues have been popular with
the market, he said, politicians “may react by introducing further measures to encourage on exchange trading as part of any review of Mifid II”.
