Trading volumes on London Stock Exchange markets set new records in November:
- A record 62.2 billion UK shares were traded in November across all markets, up 58 per cent on the same month last year when 39.4 billion shares were traded. The previous record was in October 2001 when 59.6 billion UK shares were traded.
- A record number of trades was recorded in November: a total of 5.12 million trades in UK and international equities, compared with the previous record in October 2001 of 5.03 million.
SETS, the electronic order book, is now central to share trading in the UK. Its continuing success and popularity drove the record-breaking market volumes in November. Business on SETS was up 136 per cent year on year (1,957,801 SETS trades in November 2001 compared with 828,541 in November 2000). The high level of trading on SETS broke three more records:
- For the third consecutive month and the seventh time this year a record number of trades was executed on SETS, 2.0 million trades in November compared with the previous record in October 2001 of 1.8 million trades.
- A record value was traded on SETS - GBP62.6 billion, compared with the previous record in January 2001 of GBP60.6bn.
- The busiest ever closing auction on SETS was recorded on 30 November. A value of GBP883.3 million was traded in the closing auction, beating the previous record of GBP524.3 million on 15 June 2001 by 68 per cent.
There were 8 IPOs during November 2001. The Exchange's markets account for 59 per cent of the total number of IPOs on western European markets in 2001.
