A quick math assignment:
@Nasdaq earned $540 million in information services (aka – #marketdata) revenue in 2016, up 5.5% over 2015 (and, not to put to fine a point on it, but this growth is slowing as 2015 v. 2014 was +8.2%).
@KCGHQ spent $148 million on communications and data processing in 2016.
@VirtuFinancial is on its way to acquiring KCG – and is on record with a strategy to ultimately consolidate both operations onto a single, unified trading platform. No doubt, this is not lip service.
What is the impact on Nasdaq – and other exchanges – whose revenue growth has become so dependent on market data sales?
If you are ambitious, here’s some additional intelligence that you could use in the analysis: (We have more in the can if you need it.)
BTW, you have to guess that all #HFT leaders have really spiffy axes, no?
