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BATS Europe Sets Dark Pool Launch For 7th Of August - Moves Forward With Europe’s First Maker-Taker Priced Dark Pool

Date 16/07/2009

BATS Europe, an innovative, wholly-owned subsidiary of BATS Global Markets, today announced the launch of its dark pool, the first with maker-taker pricing in Europe, set for Friday, the 7th of August.

The fast-growing multilateral trading facility (MTF) will rebate 0.1 basis points to participants that add liquidity and charge 0.25 basis points to remove liquidity in the dark pool.

Following the satisfactory conclusion of discussions with the Financial Services Authority, BATS Europe's dark pool will be available for participant testing on Monday, 20th of July.

”We are pleased with the progress of BATS Europe’s unique dark pool offering and look forward to going live in August,” said BATS Europe CEO Mark Hemsley. “Participants will be able to receive rebates on posted liquidity and enjoy low rates for removing liquidity, consistent with our approach of offering first class markets with aggressive fee structures.”

The new dark pool is separate from BATS Europe’s current integrated book, which combines visible and hidden order types. BATS Europe participants can send orders to the dark pool using existing FIX handlers with orders hidden and executed at the midpoint of the best bid and offer on the primary market.

A range of features for orders, such as setting a minimum execution quantity, are included in BATS Europe’s dark pool offering.

The BATS Europe FIX specification now includes dark pool instructions. The full specification is available at http://www.batstrading.co.uk/resources/participant_resources/BATS_Europe_FIX_Specification.pdf.