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the authoritative source of bond transparency.
In a statement published online, Danesh said:“ The uncertainty discourages innovation and investment in the very fintech ecosystem the government has sought to promote. That risks shifting liquidity and market influence away from London— at precisely the moment the UK is striving to reaffirm its global leadership.”
Additionally, many UK bonds are traded on European venues, and vice versa, so what will this mean for the industry, and more specifically, how will traders be able to navigate this?
Murphy highlighted the importance of ensuring the market is informed and prepared ahead of the tapes’ arrival, commenting:“ It ' s about engagement with the market on the consumer side, so raising awareness and trying to make sure that people are prepared for this new data set coming, so that they engage with it early on and can see the value in the process.”
As often comes with new developments, the prospect of a tape, or rather, two separate tapes may seem daunting to some in the industry. Speaking on such attitudes, Ruffles commented:“ There ' s so much uncertainty about what a tape will look like. I think one of the most interesting things is that it ' s a consolidated tape, but it ' s not consolidated because there ' s two of them.
“ We ' re going to end up with an FCA tape and an ESMA tape and we have to be able to do something with both sets of data and they have different transparency regimes. I can understand why people are scratching their heads.”
This sentiment was also reiterated by Danesh, who spoke to the difficulties and reactionary measures that may be taken to encompass both tapes.
He said:“ The whole point of the consolidated tape is to consolidate data by definition. But hang on, there are two of them. Who ' s going to consolidate the consolidated tapes? A market participant who wants to see the whole market view of bond trading activity will need to subscribe to both tapes. Our best
“ The whole point of the consolidated tape is to consolidate data by definition. But hang on, there are two of them. Who ' s going to consolidate the consolidated tapes? Post-Brexit we now have two jurisdictions, but you still see quite a lot of Eurozone bonds traded in the UK.”
SASSAN DANESH, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OF ETRADING SOFTWARE
guess is that there will be data vendors who spring up so that who will subscribe to both CTPs and then provide a single normalised feed to end users.”
The tip of the iceberg? Although ESMA’ s CTP selection has now concluded, uncertainty still remains around what will happen with the UK tape, as well as what will come next from both ventures. Once authorisation is received, official operations will begin, and the providers will begin to coordinate with contributors including trading venues and approved publication arrangements( APAs) to set the development of the tape and consolidation of data into practice.
If the legal challenge is dismissed, the FCA’ s contract for Etrading Software is estimated to begin on 5 January 2026 for a five-year period, while once authorised, Ediphy’ s tenure will begin. What plays out over the next few weeks and months, as well as those five years, and how the fixed income industry will look by the end of this period is not yet known but as discussed, remains subject to intense dialogue within the industry.
So, what is there to do now? At present, it seems all we can do is sit and wait with bated breath.
56 // TheTRADE // Q3 2025