The Boston Stock Exchange (BSE), a mutual organization that manages or regulates multiple ventures, announced Sept. 5 that it has discontinued the operations of the Boston Equities Exchange (BEX).
BEX was launched in August 2005 as an electronic stock exchange but failed to gain market share, according to BSE. BEX did not see significant gains during a summer of record trading volume.
The BSE will continue to be active in the marketplace and will support its remaining ventures including the regulation of the Boston Options Exchange (BOX).
It’s not rare to see an exchange disappear because of low trading volume. It is strange nowadays, however, to see an exchange just disappear versus watching two other exchanges duke it out to see who gets to buy it and for how much. Of course, the BEX was not a long-running profitable exchange, and, equities are not futures.
Is this a sign that it’s getting harder for exchange to find ways to gather new market share?
Well, BOX, a fully automated market that opened in 2004, has also struggled to gain market share and typically ranks last in volume among the six U.S. options exchanges. However, BSE says BOX’s innovative technologies and pricing strategies have kept it successful.
So is it then, that a small and new exchange will only work if you have innovation?
Also, to be gone by November are two trading rooms at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) leaving it with only two remaining. And it had closed one floor already earlier this year.
The Chicago Mercantile Exchange recently said it would cease floor trading in certain agricultural futures contracts. The NYSE also closed another floor earlier this year.
Who knows how long the last two floors at the NYSE will last.