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No roses without thorns Undoubtedly, the introduction of a consolidated tape in Europe and the UK will bring a bounty of benefits to the fixed income world, but as is often the case with new ventures, this also comes with potential obstacles.
As the selection processes have progressed, it has become clear that public authorities are keen to ensure the tapes are commercially viable, meaning that the transparency regime implemented needs to be sufficiently expansive, to ensure that a large number of trades do get published in real time and the value of the tape can be realised. In other words, for bigger trades, if the transparency regime is calibrated in a manner that too many trades are getting
“ The key thing here is that there is no mandatory consumption, and therefore the tape has to have enough value for everyone wanting to take it.”
SASSAN DANESH, CHIEF EXECUTIVE AT ETRADING SOFTWARE
deferred, the value of the tape will lower.
Danesh commented on this potential hurdle, stating:“ One key challenge that I ' m sure was at the forefront of all the bidders’ thought processes was that since this is entirely new commercial undertaking, it’ s difficult for all of us to have a solid understanding of what the demand would be.
The key thing here is that there is no mandatory consumption, and therefore the tape has to have enough value for everyone wanting to take it. The cost of the tape will be low, but the data coming in is directly linked to the transparency regime. And for that, everything has to be published.”
An additional concern frequently highlighted in conversations around the tape is the governance model. Across the board, market participants have clamoured for a means to influence the evolution of the tape’ s service over the five-year period, to reflect changes in market structure over that time. As a result, both the European and UK’ s tapes are expected to have advisory committees set up by the CTP, to ensure input from the market is received. The FCA has explicitly set out the requirement for a user consultative body for the UK bond consolidated
54 // TheTRADE // Q3 2025