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Listing activities at the Luxembourg Stock Exchange: slightly down
As at 30 June 2009 the Luxembourg Stock Exchange had a total of 47,134 quotation lines on its two markets. This represents a slight decrease of 1.94% over one year and 4.00% over six months. This downward trend was expected within the context of the global financial and economic crisis. Despite this decline, listing activity now appears to have stabilized and the Luxembourg Stock Exchange clearly it retains leading position listing for international securities.
The number of quotation lines on its regulated market amounted to 41,672 while 5,462 were listed on its Euro MTF market. These were made up of the following: 31,401 bonds, 283 shares (including 219 Depository Receipts), 7,870 investment funds (including 7,718 Luxembourg funds) and 7,580 warrants.
Trading activities: up
For the first half of 2009, trading volume at the Luxembourg Stock Exchange reached an amount of EUR 151.117 million, representing an increase of 47.31% over the same period last year. The daily average stood at EUR 1.239 million, an increase of 49.72% over twelve months.
The share portion of trading volumes was 87.11%, or EUR 131.641 million, while the bond segment accounted for 12.20%, or EUR 18.430 million.
The LuxX index closed the first half at 1118.31 points, up 14.01% over six months.
Launch of OAM services
Since 1 January 2009, the Luxembourg Stock Exchange has offered “OAM” (Officially Appointed Mechanism) services to issuers of securities that are traded on a regulated market and are within the competence of the Luxembourg supervisor, the CSSF.
By virtue of its status as Officially Appointed Mechanism for Luxembourg, the Luxembourg Stock Exchange has established an infrastructure that enables issuers covered by the Law of 11 January 2008 on transparency requirements to fulfil part of their obligations under the Law.
To date, 180 filing entities representing some 300 issuers use the OAM service of the Exchange.
Migration to the UTP platform
Since 9 March 2009, all securities on both markets of the Luxembourg Stock Exchange - the regulated market and Euro MTF market – have been able to be traded on the UTP platform (Universal Trading Platform) of NYSE Euronext.
The migration of all securities on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange to the UTP platform is an important step in the partnership agreement between the Exchange and NYSE Euronext, one of the components of which is to establish a European standard for the admission and trading of corporate bonds.
Created by NYSE Euronext, UTP is a unique trading platform for various markets of the transatlantic group of exchanges. It relies on unified communication protocols both in terms of order entry and market data.
Stock Exchange Day 2009
Held on 28 April 2009 at the Hemicycle conference centre, this year’s Stock Exchange Day was once again a success with over 700 guests drawn from Luxembourg’s economic, social and financial circles in attendance.
The guest speaker of the evening was Klaus-Peter Müller, chairman of the supervisory board of Commerzbank AG, who gave a speech entitled “Towards a new world economic order-the role of security”.
Visits to the Exchange and promotion of the Luxembourg financial centreIn line with its position as an essential pillar of the Luxembourg financial centre, the Luxembourg Stock Exchange contributed greatly to the promotion of the financial centre during the first half of 2009.
It took part in various events abroad, including the Luxembourg For Finance (LFF) mission to central and eastern Europe visiting Prague, Warsaw and Vienna, as well as in Luxembourg for the Luxembourg Financial Forum held on 29 May 2009.
Furthermore, the Luxembourg Stock Exchange received delegations from several countries including Laos, Egypt and Russia. The activities of the Exchange as well as the strengths of the financial centre were presented to all these visitors.
Mathematics prize
The Luxembourg Stock Exchange signed on 25 June 2009 an agreement with the Sciences Section of the Institut Grand-Ducal covering the sponsoring of a mathematics prize.
The science prizes of the Institut Grand-Ducal were set up to honour researchers, of any nationality who are working in Luxembourg or who are Luxembourg citizens carrying out research abroad, for the quality of their work or for outstanding discoveries in various scientific fields.
As certain aspects of the functioning of capital markets are based on mathematical analysis and models, the Luxembourg Stock Exchange decided to give its support to the mathematics prize, which will also contribute to the development of scientific research in Luxembourg.
80th anniversary
On 6 May 2009, the Luxembourg Stock Exchange celebrated its 80th anniversary. Incorporated as a public limited company in April 1928, the Luxembourg Stock Exchange held its first the market session 6 May 1929.
It was during the sixties, however, when it found its true role as a result of its Eurobond listings, thus attracting via this activity and its dynamism in this area, capital markets professionals and specialists to the Luxembourg financial centre.
Today it is recognized as the leading European centre for listing international bonds. Its market share in this area is about 43% compared with other European stock exchanges.
