Whether equities will eventually adopt the 24/7 model is another story all together, however. Zoom in further, and approaches to the subject differ greatly depending on where you are on the globe. Sentiment surrounding the feasibility of the extension of trading hours remains starkly different in the US in comparison with the UK and Europe for example, where institutions in recent years have petitioned to shorten the trading day.

While US venues have been more aggressive in recent months with their desire to expand trading hours in equities, those in Europe and the UK appear to be dragging their heels, with no apparent plans on the horizon to follow suit. And the same US-led proactivity can be seen in the global shift to shortened settlement that is currently underway. 

“Discussions about extending US equity market trading hours have resurfaced, especially following the implementation of T+1 settlement [last year]. This move aims to compete with digital assets that offer continuous 24/7 trading,” says Eric Heleine, head of e-trading and data at AXA Investment Managers Core. 

US venues have been bullish in the last 12 months with plans to extend their trading hours. Several platforms, including OTC Markets and Blue Ocean Technologies, have offered out of hours trading for some time now, but recent moves by major exchanges suggest the topic is set to become increasingly mainstream.

In October 2024, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) proposed plans to extend weekday US equities trading on its NYSE Arca platform to 22 hours a day, subject to regulatory approvals. Meanwhile, 24X National Exchange received approval from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for near-continuous sessions for equities trading. 

Cboe Global Markets revealed plans in February of this year to expand its trading hours for US equities, moving to a 24/5 model, subject to regulatory approvals. This was followed by news revealed in March that Nasdaq had begun engaging with regulators to enable 24/5 trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market.  

The potential benefits are clear and include the ability to respond to episodic events and manage risk in real-time. The extension also offers US traders a greater overlap with other regions in different time zones.

“Demand for 24-hour trading is largely focused on US markets, with increasing demand from other regions to trade US equities and gain exposure to specific indices or to specific stocks,” states Magnus Haglind, senior vice president and head of market infrastructure technology at Nasdaq.

“While it’s US-centric today in terms of liquidity and interest, it’s an emerging trend that is likely to spread across other markets.”

Retail-led innovation

Whether the push in the US is fuelled by institutions is another question all together. Depending on where an individual sits in the trading value chain, their priorities tend to differ. 

For the retail segment, the move could mean access to markets in times that are more suitable to an individual trader. However, for institutional investors – who often seek to reduce market toxicity and fragmentation – there is, a preference for shorter trading sessions.

“It gives the retail market the opportunity to react to overnight news, geopolitical headlines, perhaps announcements that come out after the core US markets are closed. It probably provides greater opportunity for the retail sector,” suggests Ed Wicks, global head of trading and liquidity management, Asset Management, Legal & General.

Amid opposing responses to expanded trading hours, there seems to be a consensus that equities shouldn’t necessarily exactly mirror crypto markets, exampled by the 24/5 model opted for by US venues. 

“We might be on the way, but 24/7 specifically is quite a way out. When you start talking about weekends and holidays, that adds many layers of complexity,” suggests Kevin Tyrrell, head of markets at NYSE.

Retail trading has been central to much of the push in the US to extend the trading day. Crypto was a game changer for many retail participants, particularly due to the ability to trade at hours that suit an individual trader. However, while the US boasts a large and growing retail market, this is something that the UK and much of mainland Europe lack. 

“The demand [for extended hours] probably comes from two market participant types. It’s the retail brokers […] and the market makers that want to interact with retail flow, because it’s generally considered relatively benign,” says John Fruen, head of EMEA market structure and liquidity strategy at UBS.

“Also, the dynamics that go into an out of general hours period, which include conditions like wider spreads, probably improve the economic terms for those market makers when providing liquidity to retail.”

From a UK/EU perspective, where retail volumes are significantly reduced, the push towards expanded trading hours appears to be far weaker, with no key reason to implement the shift, at least from an institutional perspective. 

“I would say that there’s maybe a bit of a bifurcation between institutional and retail. To my knowledge, most of the demand that is coming out tends to be either US-based or Asia-based retail demand, rather than what I would call core institutional demand,” argues Wicks.

“Am I advocating for 24-hour trading to support our business in US equities – or any equities for that matter? Not at the moment, no. Additionally, because much of the overnight demand at the moment is mainly from retail type investors, you run the risk of having slightly elevated volatility in those sessions.”

Less is more?

Even from an exchange perspective in the EU, no consensus has been reached on whether to expand or even reduce market hours for equities, despite several major initiatives announced in the US in recent months. 

“We ran a consultation for our participants both on the continent and in the UK and no clear consensus emerged from it. In summary, the UK was more in favour of shortening whilst the continent preferred a status quo,” says Vincent Boquillon, head of cash equities at Euronext.

“So given that there was no consensus among industry participants on buy-side, sell-side and industry associations, we don’t see the immediate need to take action in that regard, however we remain fully supportive to engage with the industry if a need materialises.”

The situation in Europe is markedly different to the one developing in the US. As opposed to extending trading hours, in 2020, buy- and sell-side traders urged the London Stock Exchange and other European venues to shorten equity trading hours to 9am to 4pm GMT, aiming to improve trading floor culture, boost diversity, and enhance intraday liquidity.

After intense debate, exchanges rejected the proposals, arguing it wouldn’t be a ‘silver bullet’ for diversity or mental health challenges.

“There are several reasons why a reduction in hours could be viewed as a positive move. The ones that are most frequently quoted include fragmentation of liquidity. We have longer trading hours in the core session than the US do, with a tenth of the volumes. We talk a lot about venue fragmentation, but time is a fragmenting element as well and liquidity may be improved by shortening those hours,” suggests UBS’ Fruen.

“The most recent argument has been around the transition to T+1 and the fact that we are going to need to do a lot more post-trade allocation processing on T0, than we do today. Asking people to stay later to do that doesn’t help work life balance in an industry which already has a reputation for longer working hours than may be offered to people elsewhere and may have an impact on the diversity of talent that can be recruited.”

Elsewhere, arguments exist that having wider coverage across the globe is more important than having extended hours to accommodate the global trading of equities. The benefits of overlapping with other markets seems more preferable than expanding or reducing trading hours. 

“On balance, there are greater advantages potentially to be garnered from overlapping with Asia and Middle Eastern markets when you’re sitting in Europe and then overlapping with the US markets,” argues Wicks. 

“I would come down on that advantage rather than reducing market hours. I don’t see the need and I wouldn’t say I’m a big advocate of reducing market hours. The overlap is important, particularly as we’re all trying to grow capital market participation.”

Culture clash 

A clear disparity exists between the US and Europe when it comes to this topic, which brings into question why such opposing views exist. Retail participation is much larger in the US, but also, liquidity dynamics and volumes are notably different too. 

“If you look at the liquidity between the US and Europe, it’s vastly different. The US has been growing. The European trading day is longer than our trading day in terms of regular market hours and it’s heavily skewed towards the closing auction. We have a very large closing auction but there’s not as much of a skew here as there is in some of the European markets,” says NYSE’s Tyrrell.

“That all adds up to just regular continuous trading. What we do even today in the extended hour sessions would just be much harder in Europe. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of liquidity in the regular hours as it is.”

Echoing this, Nadsaq’s Haglind notes that from a global investor perspective, there is a huge focus on the US as a market of choice based on the depth of the liquidity. “Through conversations with our European technology clients, based in the middle of global time zones, there isn’t the same level of demand compared to the US. However, market operators are increasingly assessing how they can enhance their infrastructure to make sure they’re ready as investor appetite increases,” he says.

“Across different client groups we see interesting dynamics between serving local market participants, with a shortening of trading hours in some cases, and the need to attract global liquidity.”

At present, it’s hard to justify European equities as having sufficient liquidity to trade on a 24/7 basis. Market participants within the region argue that that’s not where the focus should lie. 

“Perhaps there’s an argument to say it makes sense to try and find ways to provide facilities for retail investors to be able to trade when they want to, in ways that give them good outcomes, to help with the overall liquidity picture,” suggests Fruen.

“But ultimately, having a core market session which includes an open, a continuous session and a close, is probably something the majority of the incumbent institutional investors and sell-sides and even venues want to maintain.”

Shifting trading desk dynamics

If the industry were to transition to extended trading hours, the changes would likely mean round-the-clock operations, increased compliance, staffing and monitoring. Trading desks, and their make-up, are defined by changes in the landscape, be it through developments such a T+1, the introduction of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, and growing global presences. 

“Trading desks are evolving and this started out with the crypto trading craze. As crypto trades 24/7 365, certain firms had overnight desks already built to support that,” says Brian Hyndman, president and chief executive at Blue Ocean Technologies.

“It was an easy extension to begin trading equities if you were already trading other asset classes overnight. We see more and more firms here in the US expanding and supporting overnight trading, or relying on their offices in Hong Kong, Tokyo or Singapore, to support their 24 by five trading.”

Some argue that the way in which trading desks are currently set up would be sufficient to allow for continuous or expanded trading hours for equities, however, this viewpoint aligns more with larger firms already operating large teams globally. For smaller firms, having a follow-the-sun model would require a lot of adaptation, including the need to set up in different geographical locations to accommodate time zones. 

“The technology we have is already managing an extension of trading hours on some market segments. There would be, for sure, adaptation to the post-trade session, which would be a challenge. But in terms of technology, we know how to do a 24/5 market today. You don’t need a revolution or innovation to do that,” says Nicolas Rivard, head of cash equity and data services at Euronext.

Despite differing viewpoints in the US versus the UK and Europe, it appears that extending trading hours in equities is going to happen. Much like with the shift to T+1, other regions may find their hand forced as the US continues to steam ahead. With an increasing number of US venues looking to implement the change, UK and EU venues could find themselves pressured to follow suit in order to remain competitive.

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The firm has said that by adding emerging market bonds to IBVAL’s offering, both buy-side and sell-side traders will be able to integrate automated pricing into their trading workflows across new markets and execute trades with higher confidence.

The move also sees IBVAL pricing coverage expanding to 22 hours a day, five days a week for the most actively traded securities. 

“As global traders evaluate opportunities to unlock alpha and improve execution in international fixed income markets, there is increasing demand for more real-time pricing insights to add greater transparency to their trading workflows,” said Eric Isenberg, head of enterprise data pricing at Bloomberg.   

“These expansions bring IBVAL’s high-quality, AI-driven pricing insights to some of the most liquid international bond markets, giving both buy-and sell-side traders across time zones more confidence in their trading decisions and execution outcomes.” 

Through this expansion, IBVAL’s coverage increases by approximately 6,000 bonds, and has brought in issuers from 98 LatAM, EMEA and APAC countries, such as Mexico, Brazil, Turkey, and China.  

The expansion also means that real-time pricing is now available across more than 95% of trade emerging market USD bonds, including both corporate and sovereign bonds, as well as emerging market EUR/GBP corporate bonds.  

Read more – Bloomberg extends IBVAL front-office pricing to cover Europe 

The push to emerging markets follows recent IBVAL expansion, after the solution was launched in 2023 to price USD credit securities. In April 2023, Bloomberg announced that the offering would cover EUR and GBP investment grade and high yield credit bonds included in Bloomberg’s flagship Europe and UK credit indices.  

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The offering will act as a neutral trading platform, and leverages 360T’s infrastructure to provide clients with efficient access to liquidity from multiple providers. 

The exchange will also offer crypto spot trading, powered by 360T’s SuperSonic product suite, and will feature streaming prices tailored to the client while also engaging with selected counterparties.  

The firm has said that the new exchange is designed to pave the way for institutional crypto spot trading, and is set to operate across the EU, as an institutional-only, MiCA (Markets in Crypto Assets Regulation) regulated trading platform.  

3DX will be led by Carlo Kölzer, founder and chief executive of 360T and head of foreign exchange and digital assets of Deutsche Börse Group, which acquired the platform in July 2015. 

He said: “Not only does the launch of 3DX demonstrate Deutsche Börse Group’s broader commitment to be a leader in the digital assets space. 

“It represents a significant milestone in 360T’s history as a global marketplace that aims to grow as a trusted partner in the evolving crypto landscape and in line with the increasing interests from our clients.” 

The platform will be accessible through GUI or API, and clients will still be able to use crypto NDFs as RFS through 360T bridge and via their automated workflows through 360T EMS.  

The digital exchange will initially support bilateral settlement with plans to adopt differing post-trade models to support clients with risk management in the future.  

Read more – 360T strikes deal to host new Quantitative Brokers FX algo suite 

Recent developments by 360T have seen the platform driving to expand its foreign exchange offering alongside its crypto business. In January 2024, the firm went live with its UK-based multilateral trading facility, 360T UK MTF, to offer trading in all foreign exchange financial instruments except spot FX. 

The platform also collaborated with execution algorithms and analytics provider Quantitative Brokers to launch a new set of FX algos in February 2025.  

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The expansion follows recent regulatory approval, and forms part of the clearinghouse’s push to become one of Europe’s leading multi-asset class central counterparty clearinghouses (CCPs).  

Cboe Clear Europe has said that ETPs set to be eligible for clearing will be subjected to specific criteria based on market capitalisation, as well as underlying asset availability and product types.  

Bitcoin, Ethereum, Tether, XRP and BNB are among the product types set to be included in the offering. 

“We are excited to broaden our clearing capabilities to encompass crypto-backed ETPs, marking another milestone in our mission to become a leading multi-asset class CCP in Europe,” said Vikesh Patel, president of Cboe Clear Europe.  

“As an organisation deeply committed to innovation and collaboration with clients to address their needs, we’re looking forward to enhancing the ability of investors to access to this evolving asset class through a highly regulated, trusted and proven market structure framework.” 

The clearinghouse has now said that it will take steps to begin working with the venues that list the eligible products.  

Read more – Cboe Clear Europe begins clearing of European Securities Financing Transactions 

Expansion of clearing services to cover a variety of assets has been a focus for Cboe Clear Europe in recent months. In March 2025, the clearinghouse announced that it had begun clearing of European Securities Financing Transactions (SFTs) in cash equities.  

The service was the first-of-its-kind to be offered and is expected to transform the bilateral process for SFTs for these asset classes into a centrally cleared model.  

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This overlapping distinction has been attributed to the rise of electronic execution for program trades and the increasingly sophisticated algorithms for single-stock trading, which represent a greater shift towards e-trading. 

According to a study conducted by Coalition Greenwich, program trades accounted for approximately $79 billion in daily trading activity in 2024, and nearly half (46%) of these trades were executed electronically, an increase of 35% in two years.  

The firm has said that buy-siders leveraging existing single-stock algorithms instead of implementing program-specific strategies has also contributed to this increase.   

“Today’s traditional single-stock algorithms are savvy are enough to be used to execute baskets of orders as single programs,” said Jesse Forster, head of equity market structure and technology at Coalition Greenwich. 

“Between workflow innovation and good old-fashion inflation, the definition of program trading itself is now in flux.” 

This push towards electronic execution and advanced algorithms has meant that there is a greater buy-side focus on the choice between high-touch and low-touch execution, with the aim of finding the method with the best trade outcome.  

Many buy-side traders use broker sales traders to offer guidance on these options, and for more than 60% of them, performance and minimising market impact are the driving force in the decision-making process.  

Forster added: “While electronic trading is becoming more prevalent, high-touch sales traders still play a vital role in program trading, particularly for complex orders or those involving non-U.S. constituents. 

“Buy-side traders value the expertise and risk management capabilities of high-touch sales traders.” 

Although this growth in the program trading space may offer challenges to smaller or regional brokers competing with larger banks, it is expected that many firms will build on this development and begin innovation and investments in next-generation program-specific strategies.  

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XTP Risk Janus is an intraday solution for pre-trade to post-trade risk management. 

The new development has been created by LIST, an ION company, and integrates the XTP Risk Janus and its Margin Engine often used in cleared derivatives trading, to improve the accuracy of CME’s SPAN2 Approximation algorithm, launched in 2023.  

The solution, which has been enhanced using AI, is expected to allow traders to obtain faster and more precise margin estimates, improving decision making and risk control outcomes in real-time.  

“We explored the possibility of using AI to apply a correction factor to SPAN2 Approximation to bring it closer to the original SPAN2 calculations,” said Riccardo Bernini, head of the financial engineering team at LIST.  

“The outcome is surprisingly good and gives our clients faster, more precise margin estimates. It ensures that they can effectively manage risk and make informed trading decisions with the speed required for pre-trade validation.” 

The new model integrates the CME SPAN 2 deployable library to calculate CME margin requirements for cleared derivatives trading and provides the option to use the group’s later algorithm, CME SPAN2 Approximation when quicker calculations are needed.  

ION has said the innovation will address issues associated with the CME SPAN 2 original model. Through improving the accuracy of CME’s SPAN 2 Approximation calculations with AI, LIST’s solution is expected to produce results which closely match the original model while also maintaining speed-efficient pre-trade validation.  

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The solution, called SIX Fixed Income Data, is designed to provide banks, asset managers, wealth managers and hedge funds globally with reliable fixed income data, based off an array of information sourced from global markets.  

The provider has said that the offering will give clients access to data for 3.6 million US instruments across municipal, corporate and government debt, and structured finance, and will reduce reliance on inconsistent and error-prone sources to price securities, manage risk, and comply with regulations.  

“Until recently, many market participants were constrained by offerings with inflexible commercial terms or forced to combine disparate data sources that lacked completeness and accuracy,” said Swati Bhatia, head of fixed income, financial information at SIX. 

“By launching SIX Fixed Income Data, we are giving market participants the coverage, reliability, and pricing flexibility they need in the asset class that represents the largest segment of the global capital markets.” 

SIX highlighted that the original issuance and lifestyle documentation of the offering is fully owned by the provider and will be available through its centralised platform.  

Similarly, it has said that SIX’s API-driven infrastructure will tackle issues of long onboarding times and disruptions that arise from using alternative solutions, by streamlining the integration of data into clients’ workflows, combined with transparent pricing and scalable licensing.  

Read more – SIX rolls out regulatory data service for digital assets 

In recent months, the expansion and launch of new data services has been a focus for the company. SIX Fixed Income Data’s announcement follows the Digital Assets Regulatory and Tax Service launched by the provider at the beginning of April 2025, designed to provide institutions with a single information source to help identify their exposure to digital assets and remain compliant with evolving regulations.   

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Teyu Che Chern

The move will deploy Integral’s platform across Phillip Nova’s NDF and FX instruments and will incorporate the fintech’s fixed-fee subscription model across the combined offering to target growing NDF demand in Asia-Pacific.  

It is expected that the expansion will provide more streamlined operational costs, mitigate cost volatility in times of volume fluctuation and allow Phillip Nova to scale its business more easily.  

“With more clients trading NDFs and FX swaps, it’s important that we continue building on infrastructure that’s both scalable and cost-efficient,” said Teyu Che Chern, chief executive of Phillip Nova.  

“Expanding our partnership with Integral lets us handle growing volumes without compromising on performance – and that’s key as we continue to grow our presence in the region.” 

The recent launch forms an extension of the two companies’ ongoing partnership, which saw Phillip Nova driving the growth of its FX spot and contract for difference (CFD) business through combining Integral’s end-to-end FX trading solution in 2021. 

Harpal Sandhu, chief executive of Integral, said: “We have witnessed first-hand how our platform’s fixed-fee pricing can enable brokerages to scale and tap into new audiences, and we are excited to support Phillip Nova as it continues to grow, innovate, and expand its footprint.” 

Read more – LMAX Group goes live with FX NDF trading in Singapore and London 

The expansion follows a drive to accommodate the market increase in NDF demand across the APAC region seen in recent years. In June 2024, LMAX Group launched FX NDF trading in Singapore and London, following the Group’s subsidiary, LMAX Exchange Singapore, receiving a recognised market operator (RMO) licence from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) in November the previous year.  

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The new solution supports real-time transparency and collaboration across the post-trade lifecycle by pairing data to improve pre-matching accuracy and reduce fail rates. It also aims to streamline workflows, deliver actionable insights, and resolve exceptions in real time. 

Settlement netting builds on Synergy’s data platform, which will enable the normalisation, visualisation, and aggregation of transaction data. It allows participants to net obligations across repos, TBAs, cash transactions and other asset classes, with the goal of improving operational efficiency and liquidity management. 

The platform enables automated communication between clients and custodians via API, reducing the need for manual intervention. 

JP Morgan contributed to the use case development and provided input and refinement during the design phase with Citi.  

“We have partnered very closely with AccessFintech on this collaboration solution as we believe it will transform the smooth operation of the repo market,” said Anthony Fraser, global head of prime financial services operations at JP Morgan. “Integrating JP Morgan’s best-in-class operating model and workflow tools with AccessFintech’s state-of-the-art technology enables us to establish a model of standardisation, transparency and seamless communication. We’re committed to delivering solutions which drive enhanced settlement efficiency and result in better outcomes for our clients.” 

The netting programme, initially piloted in the €15 trillion EMEA repo market, matches transaction details centrally across trading counterparties, replacing manual spreadsheet calculations for netting obligations.  

It also supports structured counterparty communication through APIs or user interfaces, aiming to improve fail rates, reduce asset movements, and lower transaction costs associated with repo settlements. 

Jaime Healy-Waters, global head of cash equity middle office and EMEA cash securities settlements at Citi, said: “We are pleased to bring this important collaboration solution to the repo market with AccessFintech. We remain intensely focused on creating solutions that enhance our clients’ investment performance and success.” 

Additionally, the Synergy network uses AI-based tools to generate settlement netting candidates in real time and draws on historical data to inform counterparty behaviours, such as settlement performance and amendment rates. 

The Synergy platform captures data across securities, derivatives, alternatives, and payments, supporting data transformation and collaboration among network participants. 

Tom Granelli, head of netting product, Synergy at AccessFintech said: “We are continuously driving industry transformation to prepare and strengthen market operations for the future. We remain intensely focused on creating solutions that enhance our clients’ investment performance and success.” 

Granelli added: “Settlement Netting is another example of our deployment of the transformative Synergy network, enabling the ecosystem to magnify their operational effectiveness and reduce unnecessary manual processes.” 

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Giovanni Vicioso

The move is expected to provide market participants with greater choice, with options between trading both a micro-sized contract (2,500 XRP) and a larger-sized contract (50,000 XRP). 

Launch is scheduled for 19 May 2025, pending regulatory approval, and follows increased demand for regulated digital asset derivatives within the industry.   

Giovanni Vicioso, global head of cryptocurrency products at CME Group said: “Interest in XRP and its underlying ledger (XRPL) has steadily increased as institutional and retail adoption for the network grows, and we are pleased to launch these new futures contracts to provide a capital-efficient toolset to support clients’ investment and hedging strategies.” 

Read more – CME Group to launch Solana futures in March 

The XRP futures will be cash-settled and based on the CME CF XRP-Dollar Reference Rate, which serves as a once-a-day reference rate of the US XRP dollar price, calculated at 16:00 GMT daily.  

The new XRP futures will join the company’s crypto product suite containing bitcoin and ether futures and options and follows the development of CME’s Solana (SOL) futures, of which 43,000 have been traded since the product was launched on 17 March 2025.  

XRP futures are also set to be brought to Robinhood, in a push to expand retail access to futures trading.  

JB Mackenzie, vice president and general manager of futures and international at Robinhood said: “Our customers have shown a deep interest in digital assets, and they will soon be able to access an even wider variety of crypto futures to complement Robinhood’s existing spot crypto offerings.” 

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