Trading On The PLUS Market Continues Strong Growth - Six Months Into MiFID Shows Doubling Of Trades And Value Against Whole Of 2007

Trading activity at PLUS Markets – London’s small and mid-cap stock exchange - continued its strong performance in April with robust figures. PLUS posted 389,681 bargains in April, representing 1,951.93 million shares, valued at £3,131.50 million. The number of trades rose by seven percent against March, with trade value up by three percent on the month.

Capturing notable market share

PLUS continues to strengthen its market share across all sectors of the UK market. In its core small and mid-cap space, PLUS now consistently attracts market share dominance of 50% or more (by number of trades) in over 600 small and mid-cap companies. These include more than 380 small and mid caps listed or quoted on the LSE and some 220 PLUS-quoted companies. Moreover, PLUS is maintaining steady market share in the FTSE Fledgling stocks (55.56%) and AIM stocks trading on its platform (40%) by number of shares.

Its penetration of large caps also continues. In one FTSE 100 stock – Alliance Trust - PLUS exceeded 10% in trade value for the month, while attracting growing market share in other FTSE 100 stocks, including:

(on-exchange total trade value)

In the six months following the implementation of MiFID in November 2007, PLUS has already recorded a total of almost two million bargains (1,918,751), in which 10,177.03 million shares were traded, representing £15,366.91 million in trade value. This is double the number of trades and value recorded on the PLUS market for the whole of 2007. (Total 2007: trades - 1,071,641; trade value - £7,508.17m; number of shares - 8,278.93m)

Cyril Theret, Business Development Director, said: “The PLUS platform is clearly meeting the challenge of providing an attractive alternative share trading venue in the UK. Order flow is coming to PLUS as a result of best execution and trade reporting requirements under MiFID rules. We continue to attract volume in some of the heaviest traded stocks, supported by our strong market share in the small and mid-caps and we intend to further increase our penetration in 2008.”

PLUS Markets is an independent stock exchange in London, with “Recognised Investment Exchange” status, and classed as a Market Operator under MiFID. Its offering includes the full range of stock exchange activities, namely: trading execution, the provision of proprietary market data and listing/quotation destinations.