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firms supporting the campaign. Alongside this, there is ongoing industry work to improve financial literacy across all age groups in the UK.
Warr: I agree that education is the single most important factor. In Europe, only about 34 % of households invest, compared to 58 % in the US. This isn’ t just about access- it reflects a lack of financial literacy, starting from school age. Basic concepts like saving, budgeting, and long-term investing need to be embedded in education systems to build a future generation of confident investors.
Digital wealth platforms are another driver of retail growth. The UK’ s $ 470 billion digital wealth market is expected to add another 1.3 million ETF investors in the next year alone. Fractional share trading will be key to this, allowing people to invest consistently, regardless of income levels. At the same time, reducing explicit and implicit costs, and encouraging retail execution on robust, regulated exchanges will drive long-term growth in this segment.
Within equities, where is liquidity today and where is it shifting to? Worrell: European equity trading has shifted notably over recent years, with lit market share declining while off-book mechanisms like periodic auctions, dark pools, and SIs have grown.
Innovation in alternative venues has brought value, giving traders more execution options, but navigating this landscape is increasingly complex without accurate consolidated data. We need a consistent, aggregated view of true liquidity to help asset managers and traders make informed choices. Until that exists, liquidity will remain fragmented and harder to access efficiently.
Warr: Bilateral and non-lit trading have gained significant share across Europe, consistent with global trends. Continuous lit trading now represents a smaller portion of the overall market. This isn’ t necessarily negative – non-lit execution can deliver price improvements and reduce market impact – but it creates challenges around transparency and oversight.
ETFs highlight this trend well. They account for about 18 % of equity trading but can spike to 40 % during volatile periods. Much of this trading happens off-exchange, making it harder
to aggregate liquidity and understand where true market depth lies. A consolidated tape is essential to provide a clearer picture of liquidity and ensure fairer competition among venues. In the long term, I expect ETFs and increased retail participation to help aggregate flows back towards transparent markets, but only if we address today’ s data and routing inefficiencies.
Are there specific segments that are more challenging to trade, if so, why? Warr: ETFs are uniquely challenging in Europe due to structural fragmentation. Although Europe and US have a similar amount of ETF products, there are nearly 13,000 individual listings across multiple venues in Europe and far fewer in the
46 // TheTRADE // Q3 2025