New US Options Exchange Battles For Market Space
By Hal Weitzman in Chicago
Published: February 25 2010 16:11 | Last updated: February 25 2010 16:18
The US equity options market is a crowded place.
Seven exchanges battle for market share and BATS, the electronic exchange group, will on Friday join the throng, further fragmenting the market and begging the question of whether there is room for another platform.BATS can afford to be a low-cost provider since it has used much of its existing equities technology to build its options platform.
Pricing alone cannot guarantee success, however, says Mark Longo of The Options Insider, a website of industry commentary. ?Pricing is easy for other exchanges to match,? he says. ?In and of itself, that?s not a long-term advantage in the options market. You have other players with deeper pockets than BATS.?