Donna Block
SHARE WORLD
I’ve come to the conclusion that having kids drives you a bit mad. I realized this when a friend in New York called to tell me that Nasdaq, the United States’s electronic share trading exchange, is going to set up shop in Europe and wants to create a strategy for 24-hour trading around the globe.
The first thing that came to mind was a cartoon my five-year-old loves, Pinky and the Brain, about two mice that try to take over the world. Every night they hatch a plan and every day it blows up in their faces and they go back to the drawing board. Is the National Association of Securities Dealers (Nasdaq) trying to take over the world?
With the help of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp (he’s been trying to take over the world for years), Japan’s Softbank, and Vivendi of France, Nasdaq plans to create a Pan-European stock exchange based in London by the end of next year.
The Nasdaq stock market is only 28 years old and is the largest electronic exchange in the US. In recent years, it has grown to surpass the New York Stock Exchange in trading volumes, largely because it recruited new technology-oriented companies.
The move into Europe follows the announcement in June of the creation of Nasdaq-Japan, which is due to open in 2001 and is part of the exchange’s vision of a global, Internet-accessible trading system.
“We expect Nasdaq-Europe to become the IPO (initial public share offering) market of choice in Europe and an important contributor to job creation and economic growth for the region,” said Nasdaq chair and CEO Frank Zarb at a news conference in London.
By improving technological efficiency and using next-generation technology to support its new trading system, Nasdaq believes global markets will soon be able to trade “seamlessly” 24 hours a day.
Nasdaq will also have the capability to undercut the trading costs of other local exchanges because of these improvements.
But the European exchanges are not going to take this lying down. Nasdaq could come up against some real resistance from European stock exchanges, many of which started preparing for pan-European stock trading before the euro was launched last year and have struggled to form a cohesive market for months. Eight national stock exchanges have joined forces to offer cross-listings of securities.
The London and Frankfurt exchanges, the largest in Europe, have made plans to launch their own common trading system early next year and a new for-profit exchange called Tradepoint Financial Networks plans to provide an electronic trading service throughout Europe.
Then there’s Techmark, the London Stock Exchanges newest electronic service that was launched as a market for British technology companies the day before the Nasdaq announcement. Will they be able compete with the greater exposure that Nasdaq Europe will be able to offer?
If Europe’s exchanges can get it together they could strike back with an announcement of their own. And an even more serious challenge could come from alternative exchanges such as Instinet – another American-based stock trading network that serves institutional and more recently individual investors after hours. If these exchanges can generate serious volume in the coming year, Nasdaq may not emerge the early leader in Europe
Nonetheless, if Nasdaq Europe is successful and if it passes muster with the European regulatory authorities, both Nasdaq and Europe stand to come out winners. Nasdaq will be able to make use of European agreements allowing exchanges to list or trade shares across the continent.
The creation of a more liquid, transparent market would help Europe’s budding equity culture.
With the Internet revolution just beginning in Europe, there’s a huge number of new high-growth companies looking for places to list. European companies, long- starved for capital, will have a new source of financing. And European investors will have potentially greater access to high- growth IPOs as well as European, Asian, and American blue chips.
Nasdaq’s launch is still a year away and since no one exchange today dominates Europe, Nasdaq will most likely be busy bolstering its presence and recruiting international bankers and brokers to become equity partners in the venture.
Whether or not it emerges triumphant from this exercise will depend on which exchange at the end of the day offers the best trading costs, liquidity, visibility for traders and those listing their companies.
Pinky and the Brain would do well to take some tips from Nasdaq. It appears it has a solid strategy for taking over the world.