EuroCTP’s appointment as European consolidated tape provider (CTP) is no longer a certainty, with big xyt announcing its entrance into the race.
“A tender, by definition, should involve various candidates. At the moment, we only have one candidate – EuroCTP. That’s not ideal. A lack of competition could be considered as a failure of the overall exercise,” co-founder and CEO of big xyt Robin Mess told Global Trading.
“Additionally, we have been incentivised to take a more active role in the tape based on feedback we’ve received from the industry. They believe that we are well equipped to deliver a tape that doesn’t just reflect the minimum requirements defined by the regulatory framework, but also to implement it in a way that reflects the long-term objectives of the industry,” he added.
EuroCTP was launched by a consortium of 15 European exchange groups, and was previously competing with joint Aquis and Cboe venture SimpliCT to be the tape provider. The latter dropped out of the race earlier this year due to a potential conflict of interest after Aquis was acquired by SIX – part of the EuroCTP project.
READ MORE: SimpliCT drops out of CTP race
ESMA is expected to begin the first phase of selection for the equities CTP in June, with the process running to the end of the year. The tape is scheduled to be authorised in the first half of 2026.
“We don’t want to compare ourselves to EuroCTP, that is up to the regulators,” Mess demurred. “However, we want to emphasise the strengths we can offer.”
He explained that many of the issues the tape will deal with have already been addressed by Big Xyt. “We all know that European markets are fragmented, that there’s no normalised view of trading activity and liquidity in general,” he said. “We have solved that problem, received positive feedback from our clients, and seen great retention.”
He also highlights the firm’s independence when compared to its competitor. “Until last year we were 100% employee owned, and our recent investor is a minority shareholder based in Europe. That means we’re completely free of any conflict of interest, and that we can more easily contribute to the objectives of the overall market. rather than only representing specific segments or firms.
“When preparing the bid we have to design a capital and governance structure that ensures long-term sustainability. We don’t want to expose the CTP to a single segment or firm – including, of course, our own.”
The firm also stresses its capital-light structure and ability to scale solutions using cloud-native technology.
Big xyt states that it is backed by industry firms, but has not yet named these entities. “It’s a work in progress,” Mess shared. “We will work hard on the ownership structure, the capital structure and the governance. Once we have formalised that with the backers, we will announce the stakeholders.”
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