By Huw Jones
LONDON (Reuters) -European stock exchanges including Euronext and Deutsche Boerse (ETR:DB1Gn) have joined forces as they seek to offer an aggregated feed of share prices for investors to spot the best deals across a fragmented trading landscape.
The exchanges said on Tuesday they have created a company that will bid in a tender to operate a record of share transactions, part of European Union moves to deepen capital markets.
Long a feature of Wall Street, the bloc has sought a "consolidated tape" or aggregated feed of share prices. Exchanges have been leery about giving away data too cheaply, but the EU has approved a law to mandate a tape, meaning exchanges will have to contribute share data for a fee.
The bloc's securities watchdog ESMA will run a public tender for a tape in equities prices, and the group of 14 exchanges, which also includes Nasdaq, SIX and Warsaw Stock Exchange, said their new company EuroCTP will bid.
EuroCTP will have its own board of directors. Jorge Yzaguirre Scharfhausen, an official at BME Exchange in Spain, will also chair EuroCTP's supervisory board, with a CEO due to be announced soon.
"The shareholders of the new company have a clear commitment to implement this significant European capital markets project and are dedicated to the long-term success and prosperity of retail investors and market participants," the exchanges said in a statement.
"The shareholders have been working on the initial initiative for more than a year and have already made significant investments, and they are committed to full financing for the development and implementation of the consolidated tape."
Cboe Europe, not part of EuroCTP, said its focus is on ensuring that the EU rules will mandate a tape that fully meets the needs of consumers and fairly rewards all data contributors without distorting how revenues are allocated.
"We continue to see members of the exchange consortium pushing in the opposite direction," said Natan Tiefenbrun, president of Cboe Europe.
Separately, MarketAxess, Tradeweb and Bloomberg have set up an independent company that wants to provide a tape for corporate and government bond prices in the EU.
Following Brexit, Britain is also looking to set up its own consolidated tapes.