In April this year, central banks and monetary authorities in 52 countries, including the United Kingdom, conducted the latest triennial survey of turnover in the markets for foreign exchange and over-the-counter (OTC) interest rate derivatives. The survey is co-ordinated on a global basis by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), with the aim of obtaining comprehensive and internationally consistent information on the size and structure of the corresponding global markets. The Bank of England conducted the UK survey, which covers the business of leading financial institutions located within the United Kingdom in these markets.
The results of the UK survey are summarised below:
- Average daily turnover in the UK foreign exchange market was $4,745 billion in April 2025, up from $3,735 billion per day as recorded in April 2022.
- The UK remains the single largest centre of foreign exchange activity with share of 37.8% of global turnover, a slight decrease from the 38.0% recorded in April 2022 and broadly in keeping with the UK global market share recorded in previous surveys.
- Average daily turnover in OTC interest rate derivatives was $4,320 billion during April 2025, increasing from the $2,359 billion per day recorded in April 2022.
- The UK market accounted for 49.6% of OTC interest rate derivatives global turnover in April 2025, and remains the largest centre in this market. The UK market share in April 2025 was higher than the market share of 42.9% recorded in April 2022, but still below the 50.6% recorded in April 2019.
The Bank of England will provide further details of the UK’s results at a later date.
The BIS is publishing preliminary global resultsOpens in a new window today, with a detailed analysis to follow in December 2025. Central banks of many other countries are also publishing their own survey results. Links to their websites can be found on the BIS website.
Notes to editors
- Guidance on coverage: Part of the increase between the 2016 and 2019 surveys reflect a more comprehensive reporting of ‘related party trades’ (see note 8 below). Users should bear in mind the more comprehensive coverage when comparing the results from 2019 onwards to those of previous years.
- A total of 51 institutions, mainly commercial and investment banks, participated in the UK survey. As with previous surveys, only firms that participate in the inter-dealer market and/or have a large active derivative business with customers were asked to complete the 2025 survey. Small institutions were not asked to participate in order to reduce their reporting burden. For those institutions active in the UK market but not participating in the survey, their transactions with participating institutions will have been recorded by those institutions.
- For the 20 business days in April 2025, participants were asked to provide details of their gross turnover in each market, broken down between specified categories of currency, transaction and counterparty. Gross turnover (measured in nominal values) is defined as the absolute total value of all deals entered into during the month – i.e. there is no netting of purchases against sales. Data were requested in terms of US Dollar equivalents, rounded to the nearest million.
- The basis of reporting was the location of the sales desk of the trade, as in the previous five surveys.
- In the United Kingdom an adjustment is made for the fact that trades between participants in the UK survey will have been reported by both parties to the transaction; other countries have also adjusted their data in this way. The BIS have, in addition, adjusted the global data for cross-border double counting prior to publication today. Aggregating published national results would overstate global turnover due to cross-border double counting.
- The Foreign Exchange Joint Standing Committee (FXJSC) publish a turnover survey for the United Kingdom every six months, based on a smaller sample of 25 financial institutions. That survey is very similar to the triennial survey except that the reporting basis is the location of trading desks as opposed to the sales desk. See The London Foreign Exchange Joint Standing Committee for further details of the FXJSC. See Results of the Semi-Annual FX Turnover Surveys in April 2025 for the April 2025 FXJSC turnover survey. Market committees in other major financial centres (including USA, Singapore, Canada, Japan and Australia) also publish more frequent surveys and details of their publications can be found in the FXJSC release.
- Turnover in foreign exchange markets is shown in Tables 1 to 4, while turnover in interest rate derivatives is shown in Tables 5 to 7.
- Related party trades are transactions between desks and offices, transactions with branches and subsidiaries, and transactions between affiliated firms. These trades are included regardless of whether the counterparty is resident in the same country as the reporting dealer or in another country. Back-to-back trades that involve the transfer of risk from the sales desk to another affiliate are included. However, trades conducted as back-to-back deals and trades to facilitate internal bookkeeping and internal risk management within the same sales desk (i.e. reporting dealer) are excluded.
Summary of UK survey results
Summary tables of UK survey results
