Trading On London Stock Exchange Continues To Set New Records

The London Stock Exchange saw a total 6.8 million equity trades across its markets during March 2005. This represented an increase of nine per cent on the total number of trades in the same month last year, despite there being two fewer business days in March this year. The average daily number of trades reached 323,152, a new record for the third consecutive month, and an increase of 19 per cent on March 2004. The average daily value traded across the Exchange was £20.9 billion, up six per cent on the same month last year.

The growth in trading continued to be driven by the success of SETS, which recorded new records during March with an average of 206,626 trades per day, up 31 per cent on March 2004. The average daily value traded on SETS was £4.0 billion, an increase of 10 per cent on the same month last year.

Included in the SETS figures, SETSmm saw an average 22,933 trades per day during March 2005, more than twice the number of trades in March 2004. The average daily value traded on SETSmm during the month was £232.4 million, an increase of 59 per cent on the average daily value traded during March last year.

March was also a good month on the primary markets. The Main Market saw seven IPOs during the month, including one international company, from India. IPOs on the main market raised a total of £429.3 million between them. There were 55 IPOs on AIM during March, raising a total of £355.7 million between them.

The total value of ETF trades during March 2005 was £639.8 million. The average daily value traded was £30.5 million, up 53 per cent on the average daily value traded in March last year.

There were 21 business days in March 2005, compared with 23 in March 2004.