BME announced today it will overhaul its trading platform (SIBE) in order to offer greater capacity and flexibility for equity trading on the Spanish stock exchange. The new technological environment is designed to deal with the future growth of the stock market and the number of trades.
In 2009 trades executed and orders placed on the Spanish stock exchange were up 53% and 25% respectively from 2008.
The overhaul of the trading platform will build on the SMART core system, the platform used by the Spanish Futures and Options Market. This decision is based on the fact that the electronic connection to the SMART platform used by market members and external applications is already developed, which in turn minimises the impact and the adaptation efforts required. This initiative allows BME to use its own and proven technology to achieve significant synergies and cost reductions.
Once the process is completed the new SIBE platform will bring trading in Equities, ETFs, Warrants, Certificates and other products under the same umbrella, in this way providing these products with ample growth potential that suits current and future market needs. Roll out of the new platform is tentatively scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2011.
Jorge Yzaguirre, Director of Equity, BME, said: "Today we embark on a process that will benefit all players in the Spanish stock market. We want to equip the Spanish Exchange with the best trading technology based on the highest levels of security and reliability. We believe this overhaul will meet all the criteria needed to strengthen the Spanish stock market's leading position in electronic equity trading".
SIBE was the first electronic trading system in the world to integrate four stock exchanges into a single order-book . The system's high capacity supports an equity market whose trading volume in 2009 exceeded €900 billion.