Today, the Commission issued a long-awaited concept release as part of its comprehensive review of the Consolidated Audit Trail (“CAT”). I hope that the comments we receive will meaningfully inform the Commission’s reassessment of the troubled and troubling CAT and prompt a broader reconsideration of our approach to financial surveillance.   The CAT, now in its teenage years, is expensive, contentious, and perilous to privacy. CAT cost overruns have been massive: the estimated annual budget of $55 million in 2016 expanded to, until very recently, an actual annual budget of almost $250 million. CAT progress has been slow; it is years behind schedule. CAT’s greatest success is its ability to generate extensive fighting among regulated entities and between regulated entities and the Commission. Over the past year the Commission has taken several important steps to address some of these longstanding concerns with the CAT. It has reduced some of the financial costs of the CAT,[1] ceased mandated collection and storage of personally identifiable information,[2] and begun reevaluating the collection of certain unnecessary and overly burdensome data fields.[3] This concept release is another meaningful step. It poses serious, substantive questions on CAT governance, technology infrastructure, data security, and funding models—questions that reflect the extensive and persistent engagement we have heard from the public in recent years. I look forward to reviewing the full range of comments.  My deepest concerns, however, remain squarely in the realms of liberty and privacy. Regulators need to be able to oversee the markets, but appropriate limits on how regulators gather, store, use, and dispose of information are essential. No matter how much the CAT’s budget is trimmed or how many data fields are pared back, the core reality remains unchanged: the CAT is a government-mandated repository of every equity and options order and trade made by every single investor in the U.S. markets. And no matter how many procedural steps we add before a regulator can access the personally identifiable information linked to those trades, an ill-intentioned regulator at the Commission or one of the many self-regulatory organizations with access to the data may be able to navigate those steps to stalk personal or political enemies. Most regulatory users will not do such things, but restraints on government power have to contemplate the few who might. The premise underlying the CAT—that the government has the right to monitor every purchase and sale decision without suspicion of wrongdoing—should trouble all of us. Americans should not have to prove their innocence by submitting their daily financial lives to comprehensive government monitoring. Why should you who have nothing to hide care? You should care because the same government that collects this data also decides what counts as wrongdoing. You should care because defending yourself against even unfounded allegations can be enormously costly in time, money, and stress. You should care if you fear a government that might use such a tool to single out individuals for personal or political reasons. You should care because complacency about a government that can scrutinize every one of your financial transactions may cultivate acceptance of a government that also peers into other areas of your private life that you may not be so willing to leave open to examination. You should care because a government that has built a backdoor into every broker may not hesitate to build backdoors elsewhere. You should care because, though I have the utmost confidence in this Commission staff and their commitment to using the CAT for appropriate regulatory purposes, a tool like the CAT inevitably creates the opportunity for future abuse by someone in government or at one of the many SROs with access to it.   This concept release gives the Commission, for the first time, a genuine opportunity to confront these fundamental concerns head-on. Can the CAT be restructured to resolve the serious questions about privacy and civil liberty, and if so, how? Would an alternative model, one that does not rely on a centralized repository, better safeguard these values? The introduction of the CCID as a substitute for social security numbers helps, but CCIDs are still linked to individual traders. Would further restricting the ability of regulators to link personally identifiable information with transaction data mitigate some of these risks? Could the Commission or the self-regulatory organizations continue to conduct effective market surveillance if the CAT were eliminated? What type of system would best protect people’s privacy?  If a system like the CAT remains in place, what robust and durable safeguards could prevent its potential weaponization against personal or political enemies? Or must we acknowledge that the very concept of a massive surveillance database may simply be incompatible with the principles of civil liberty that are foundational to our society? I hope commenters will take advantage of this opportunity to help us fundamentally rethink the architecture of market oversight with an eye not only toward cost, convenience, and efficacy, but also toward the basic rights of people to participate in the market unwatched absent suspicion of wrongdoing. My harsh criticisms of the CAT and my broader concerns about what it represents should not be mistaken for criticisms of the Commission staff. For more than a decade, the staff of the Division of Trading and Markets, the Office of General Counsel, and the Division of Economic and Risk Analysis have worked tirelessly through extraordinarily complex issues amidst relentless criticism from all sides, shifting priorities, and the constant threat and reality of litigation. The CAT team has been consistently thoughtful, patient, and responsive in engaging with my concerns on this release, and other CAT projects. Working on the CAT can often feel like a thankless endeavor, but I sincerely appreciate the team’s sustained commitment to this project. In particular, I would like to thank Erika Berg for her remarkable efforts in bringing this release to completion without neglecting the never-ending flow of daily CAT tasks.  [1] See, e.g., Securities Exchange Act Release No. 105107 (Mar. 27, 2026), 91 FR 16284 (Apr. 1, 2026); see also Press Release, SEC Approves Amendment to NMS Plan to Further Reduce the Costs of the Consolidated Audit Trail (Mar. 27, 2026), https://www.sec.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2026-31-sec-approves-amendment-nms-plan-further-reduce-costs-consolidated-audit-trail. [2] See, e.g., Securities Exchange Act Release No. 104586 (Jan. 13, 2026), 91 FR 2164 (Jan. 16, 2026). [3] See, e.g., Securities Exchange Act Release Nos. 104662 (Jan. 23, 2026), 91 FR 3572 (Jan. 27, 2026); 104663 (Jan. 23, 2026), 91 FR 3601 (Jan. 27, 2026); 104664 (Jan. 23, 2026), 91 FR 3557 (Jan. 27, 2026). 

The average daily trading volume for the period 12/04 – 16/04 reached JD (17.0) million compared to JD (14.0) million for the last week, a increase of (21.7%). The total trading volume during the week reached JD(85.0) million compared to JD (69.8) million during the last week. Trading a total of (25.1) million shares through (21805) transactions. Services led the trading with JD(33.18) million or (39.05%) of the total trading volume. The Industrial followed with a JD(30.08) million or (35.41%). Finally, the Financial with a JD(21.69) million representing(25.54%) of the total trading volume. The shares price index closed at (3791.1) points, compared to (3707.4) points for the last week, an increase of (2.26%). The Services index increased by (5.92%), the Industrial index increased by (3.7%), and the Financial index decreased by (0.02%). The shares of (134) companies were traded, the shares prices of (46) companies rose, and the shares prices of (64) declined. The top five gainers during the week were, the Jordan Petroleum Refinery by (14.57%), United Cable Industries by (14.40%), Specialized Investment Compounds by (13.16%), Amad Investment & Real Estate Development by (11.42%), and Middle East Holding by (10.65%). The top five losers were, the Contempro For Housing Projects by (16.49%), Union Investment Corporation by (12.50%), Union Tobacco & Cigarette Industries by (10.00%), Dimensions:jordan And Emirates Commercial Investments Corporation by (9.80%), and Al-tahdith For Real Estate Investments Company by (7.59%). Note: The list of the top five gainers or losers may include companies whose reference prices have been adjusted due to actions executed during the summary period. Therefore, the appearance of such companies does not necessarily reflect an actual change in their stock prices.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) today published its 2024 Dashboard on high earners. The data shows an increase in the number of individuals in EU banks earning more than EUR 1 million. The Report also confirms that gender imbalance persists, with high‑paid positions still predominantly held by men in both credit institutions and investment firms. In 2024, the total number of high earners increases at 2 554 (from 2 343 in 2023). In credit institutions, the number increased by 7% (from 2 122 in 2023 to 2 266 in 2024). In investment firms, it rose by 30% (from 221 in 2023 to 288 in 2024). This development is mainly linked to i) strong profitability supported by higher interest income and active trading, alongside a rebound in advisory and capital markets; ii) favourable economic conditions, including elevated interest rates and renewed M&A activity; and iii) competitive pay adjustments justified by the firms as warranted to attract and retain talent. The weighted average ratio of variable to fixed remuneration for high earners in credit institutions increased to 98 %. For investment firms, the average ratio fell to 359%. The cap on variable-to-fixed remuneration laid down in the Capital Requirements Directive (CRD) has not applied to investment firms since 2021. Click here for full details.

The Securities and Exchange Commission today issued a concept release soliciting public comment in support of a comprehensive review of the Consolidated Audit Trail (CAT) and other audit trails and related data sources currently used in the regulation of U.S. securities markets. The concept release seeks comment on topics including, but not limited to, CAT funding and cost management, the regulatory purpose of the CAT, the structure and governance of the CAT, the design and scope of the CAT, and the cybersecurity and data privacy of the CAT and other audit trails and related data sources, as well as comments regarding the appropriate balance between privacy and confidentiality considerations, civil liberties protections, and regulatory need. “Under my leadership, the Commission has made meaningful progress to reform the CAT and strike a better balance between regulatory use, costs, funding, and security considerations,” said SEC Chairman Paul S. Atkins. “Over the last year, the Commission has issued exemptive relief and approved amendments to the national market system plan governing the CAT that have, among other benefits, reduced the CAT’s projected annual operating costs by over $100 million and permanently eliminated the reporting of personal identifiable information to the CAT.” “However, we can – and must – do more,” Chairman Atkins continued. “Accordingly, the concept release seeks comment on foundational and existential aspects of the CAT. The Commission is aware of the need to address many aspects of the CAT, and public comment is a crucial piece of the comprehensive review currently under way.” Jamie Selway, Director of the SEC’s Division of Trading and Markets, said, “The Division is looking forward to engaging with the public with respect to our comprehensive review of the CAT. We anticipate that the concept release issued by the Commission today will provoke meaningful dialogue.” SEC concept releases are a means for the Commission to obtain public input on policy topics in advance of pursuing any related regulatory action. Concept releases typically outline a topic of interest, identify potential options, and raise specific questions for public commenters to consider.  In this concept release, the Commission welcomes comment on possible regulatory responses related to topics identified in the release or otherwise proposed by commenters with respect to the CAT, including comments on any costs, burdens, or benefits that may result from such regulatory responses. The public comment period will remain open for 60 days following publication of the concept release in the Federal Register. Resources Concept Release Fact Sheet Submit Public Comments

Thank you, Commissioners Peirce and Uyeda, for your remarks today and for your engagement on options market structure. In particular, I’d like to credit Commissioner Peirce with the idea of this roundtable. Her advocacy and leadership on options helped make today possible, and her intellectual curiosity, passion for our work, and dedication to core Commission principles regularly make our Division better. I also want to thank our moderators and distinguished panelists for lending us your valuable time, expertise, and experience today to help inform the Commission and the investing public we serve.  We are confident that this group will lead us through a lively, thought-provoking, and informative discussion about current issues in the options market. Before I begin, please note that my remarks today are provided in my official capacity as the Commission’s Director of the Division of Trading and Markets, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Commission, the Commissioners, or members of the staff. This disclaimer also applies to the comments of my Division colleagues who will join me as part of today’s program. As we explore current topics in options market structure today, it is useful to remember the Commission’s last deep dive into the listed options waters was in 2004: a Concept Release on Competitive Developments in the Options Markets. The Concept Release reflected on fundamental questions about how competition, technology, and investor protection intersect in the options market. It came on the heels of a transformational time for options. Multiple-listing had been introduced in August 1999, driving venue competition. The International Securities Exchange launched in May 2000, becoming the first new entrant in the options market in more than two decades. Controversy marked introduction of payment of order flow and internalization to options markets then, as execution venues sought to differentiate themselves to customers. Some of the questions raised in the Concept Release, such as the appropriateness of execution quality disclosure to options trading, remain relevant today. Now, more than 20 years later, the options market has seen phenomenal growth, with increasing retail participation and the addition of more options exchanges – and hence competition and investor choice. At the same time, options markets are working harder than ever. The sharp increase in the number of options classes and series and exploding quote traffic necessitate higher levels of technological investment and capital commitment. And despite these transformative changes, liquidity is even more concentrated in a limited set of the most active symbols, wide spreads are common in less liquid symbols, large market makers occupy a significant number of specialist appointments, and consolidators control the vast majority of retail flow. Many of the same issues from 2004 persist. It is therefore incumbent upon us to re-inform ourselves and revisit where things stand. In our first segment, we will delve deeper into these trends via data. As we listen, consider that what’s old is new again, albeit with a modern twist. As the options market evolves, many of the underlying policy questions with which the Commission and market participants have grappled over the years remain familiar. But today, we consider those policy questions in a landscape that is profoundly more automated, interconnected, and complex than ever before. For example, we continue to consider ways to promote and facilitate competition, while addressing any potential negative effects of fragmentation. At the same time new issues have emerged, like short-term options series with more expirations during the week. And ORF. Though, I am happy to say that in the case of the Options Regulatory Fee, every exchange has amended its rules as part of a successful, if long-overdue, industry-led reform effort. This reform will move the marketplace to a more equitable and fair regulatory funding model on July 1 of this year. And to the exchange leader who volunteered last fall to participate in an ORF roundtable on December 24, your Christmas comes early in 2026. Today’s roundtable is an effort by the Commission to once again engage with market participants in a thoughtful dialogue on these issues and to reexamine and reaffirm an approach that supports transparency, fairness, and competition in the markets that investors rely on every day. We should consider how to respond to changing market dynamics, whether in technology, trading behavior, or market participation, and reflect on our collective past experience and lessons learned as we do so. I expect that today’s panels will provide robust discussions that will help us assess these important market structure issues. First, we will hear from Jesse Brady and Ethan Coombs in the Division’s Office of Analytics and Research. Jesse and Ethan will present highlights from their paper that was released last week to support today’s discussion. The paper is available on the roundtable webpage and on the Commission’s market structure analytics page. The data describes key trends observed in the options market in recent years. Following the presentation, we will have three panel discussions. Panel one, moderated by Division colleague Arun Manoharan, will examine how the current options market structure facilitates or hinders the ability of liquidity providers to compete fairly and freely in furtherance of a robust national market system. Our second panel will discuss the customer experience with listed options. Division colleagues Jon Kroeper and Eric Juzenas will moderate.  After lunch, Chairman Atkins will make remarks. Our third and final panel will be moderated by Richard Holley and will consider the growth of listed options, the associated challenges and opportunities that growth presents, and the issues that the Commission and market participants should consider in the years ahead. Again, thank you to everyone participating in today’s roundtable. We look forward to exploring with you an interesting and always-evolving segment of the marketplace, which is increasingly important to investors. I’ll now turn it over to Jesse and Ethan. 

The Athens Exchange today welcomed the management, executives, and partners of PREMIA Properties on the occasion of the listing of the company’s new bond issuance. The Chairman, Mr. Ilias Georgiadis, and the Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Kostas Markazos, officially rang the opening bell to commence the trading session. “PREMIA Properties, in its current corporate form following the acquisition of PASAL Real Estate in 2021, has raised a total of €348 million from the Greek capital market—€250 million through two bond issuances and €98 million through share capital increases. This clearly demonstrates the company’s confidence in the domestic market’s ability to support corporate growth plans by providing access to capital from a strong base of domestic and international investors, as reflected in the high levels of oversubscription. The successful completion of this issuance, despite a challenging international environment, reaffirms PREMIA Properties’ strong position in the real estate sector and its ability to attract high-quality investment capital. We wish the management every success in executing its strategy and achieving its objectives,” stated the CEO of Athens Exchange Group, Mr. Yianos Kontopoulos. The Chairman of PREMIA Properties, Mr. Ilias Georgiadis, commented: “This bond issuance represents a significant milestone for PREMIA Properties and reflects the strong vote of confidence from the investment community. Even amid ongoing market volatility, our team, under the leadership of CEO Kostas Markazos, has achieved another important milestone, continuing steadily on our path toward delivering our long-term growth strategy.” The CEO of PREMIA Properties, Mr. Kostas Markazos, added: “We would like to thank the investment community for the trust it has shown in PREMIA Properties during particularly challenging times, as evidenced by the strong oversubscription of our bond—our second issuance within five years. We are especially proud of the continued support from thousands of retail investors who consistently place their trust in us. The new capital will enable us to further accelerate our investment program, expand our portfolio, and enhance our profitability.” Finally, the Vice Chairman of the Hellenic Capital Market Commission, Mr. Michael Fekkas, noted: “The successful completion of PREMIA Properties’ bond offering sends a clear message to the market: even amid heightened international uncertainty and geopolitical risks, the Greek capital market remains capable of inspiring confidence and effectively supporting capital raising for credible investment initiatives. This success extends beyond the company itself; it reflects the ongoing maturation of the market, the strengthening of its institutional credibility, and its resilience under demanding conditions. The Hellenic Capital Market Commission remains committed to fostering a transparent, reliable, and efficient market that enhances investor confidence and supports the sustainable financing of the real economy.”

The Securities and Exchange Commission today issued a conditional exemptive order that permits customer cross-margining of cash market positions in U.S. Treasury securities cleared by a registered clearing agency and futures positions in U.S. Treasury securities cleared by a registered derivatives clearing organization. The order provides for an exemption from the broker-dealer customer protection rule for a broker-dealer that is dually-registered as a futures commission merchant with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and is a joint clearing member of the clearing agency and derivatives clearing organization, to permit the broker-dealer to make cross-margining available to certain customers in a futures account provided the conditions of the order are met. In addition, the Securities and Exchange Commission approved a proposed rule change filed by the Fixed Income Clearing Corporation (FICC) pursuant to which it would enter into a proposed Third Amended and Restated Cross-Margining Agreement with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. (CME) and incorporate that agreement into the FICC Government Securities Division rules, along with related rule changes. The agreement would extend the availability of cross-margining to positions cleared and carried for customers by a dually registered broker-dealer and futures commission merchant that is a common member of FICC and CME. The agreement and related rules are consistent with the exemptive order. Prior to today only clearing members could cross-margin futures positions in U.S. Treasury securities cleared at CME with cash market positions in U.S. Treasury securities cleared at FICC. “Today’s issuance of orders completes another step in the implementation of Treasury clearing,” said SEC Commissioner Mark T. Uyeda, who has been leading the SEC’s efforts in this area. “It advances the goal of both the SEC and the CFTC to unlock additional liquidity and helps ensure the market for U.S. Treasury securities remains resilient.” The exemptive order and order approving the proposed rule change will be available on SEC.gov before publication in the Federal Register, and a related CFTC exemptive order will be available on CFTC.gov and also in the Federal Register. Resources Order FICC Rule

The U.S. Department of the Treasury today released Treasury International Capital (TIC) data for February 2026.  The next release, which will report on data for March 2026, is scheduled for May 18, 2026.  The sum total in February of all net foreign acquisitions of long-term securities, short-term U.S. securities, and banking flows was a net TIC inflow of $184.5 billion.  Of this, net foreign private inflows were $166.5 billion, and net foreign official inflows were $18.0 billion. Foreign residents increased their holdings of long-term U.S. securities in February; their net purchases were $101.1 billion.  Net purchases by private foreign investors were $147.3 billion, and net sales by foreign official institutions were $46.1 billion. U.S. residents increased their holdings of long-term foreign securities, with net purchases of $42.6 billion. After including adjustments, such as estimated foreign portfolio acquisitions of U.S. stocks through stock swaps, overall net foreign purchases of long-term securities are estimated to have been $58.6 billion in February. Foreign residents increased their holdings of U.S. Treasury bills by $91.6 billion.  Foreign resident holdings of all dollar-denominated short-term U.S. securities and other custody liabilities increased by $87.4 billion. Banks’ own net dollar-denominated liabilities to foreign residents increased by $38.6 billion. Complete data are available on the Treasury website here. ### About TIC Data The monthly data on holdings of long-term securities, as well as the monthly table on Major Foreign Holders of Treasury Securities, reflect foreign holdings of U.S. securities collected primarily on the basis of custodial data.  These data help provide a window into foreign ownership of U.S. securities, but they cannot attribute holdings of U.S. securities with complete accuracy.  For example, if a U.S. Treasury security purchased by a foreign resident is held in a custodial account in a third country, the true ownership of the security will not be reflected in the data.  The custodial data will also not properly attribute U.S. Treasury securities managed by foreign private portfolio managers who invest on behalf of residents of other countries.  In addition, foreign countries may hold dollars and other U.S. assets that are not captured in the TIC data.  For these reasons, it is difficult to draw precise conclusions from TIC data about changes in the foreign holdings of U.S. financial assets by individual countries. TIC Release for April       TIC Monthly Reports on Cross-Border Financial Flows       (Billions of dollars, not seasonally adjusted)                 12 Months Through                     2024 2025 Feb-25 Feb-26 Nov Dec Jan Feb     Foreigners' Acquisitions of Long-Term Securities                                             1     Gross U.S. Sales of Domestic U.S. Securities 70193.6 89220.0 72786.7 93971.1 7796.5 9015.9 8440.8 9077.8 2     Gross U.S. Purchases of Domestic U.S. Securities 69008.8 87612.9 71538.1 92355.7 7588.1 8890.7 8390.4 8976.6 3     Domestic Securities, net U.S. sales (line 1 less line 2) /1 1184.9 1607.2 1248.5 1615.4 208.5 125.2 50.4 101.1                             4       Private, net /2 1190.3 1596.7 1355.4 1545.6 144.2 118.0 28.5 147.3 5         Treasury Bonds & Notes, net 516.6 455.1 532.6 322.3 36.3 -0.1 -13.8 28.0 6         Gov't Agency Bonds, net 127.2 113.3 118.5 136.1 -11.1 13.2 15.1 20.8 7         Corporate Bonds, net 264.3 348.1 249.0 370.5 47.7 17.3 10.6 48.5 8         Equities, net 282.2 680.2 455.3 716.7 71.2 87.7 16.6 50.0                             9       Official, net /3 -5.5 10.4 -106.9 69.8 64.2 7.2 21.8 -46.1 10         Treasury Bonds & Notes, net -26.8 -34.0 -86.5 36.6 33.2 -21.1 50.6 -26.0 11         Gov't Agency Bonds, net -44.2 -57.1 -52.7 -48.4 -2.6 -3.6 -5.2 0.3 12         Corporate Bonds, net 40.2 39.2 33.4 43.6 10.3 0.5 1.3 5.9 13         Equities, net 25.3 62.3 -1.0 38.0 23.3 31.4 -24.9 -26.3                             14     Gross U.S. Sales of Foreign Securities 18304.9 23184.4 19123.8 24762.4 2069.4 2244.7 2512.8 2435.1 15     Gross U.S. Purchases of Foreign Securities 18713.7 23506.0 19524.5 25094.6 2081.5 2269.7 2560.7 2477.7 16     Foreign Securities, net U.S. sales (line 14 less line 15) /4 -408.8 -321.6 -400.7 -332.1 -12.1 -25.0 -47.9 -42.6 17         Foreign Bonds, net -260.3 -213.6 -254.1 -221.8 -21.4 -19.7 -44.7 -23.6 18         Foreign Equities, net -148.5 -108.0 -146.6 -110.4 9.3 -5.3 -3.3 -18.9                             19     Net Long-Term Securities Transactions (lines 3 and 16): 776.1 1285.6 847.8 1283.2 196.4 100.2 2.4 58.6                             20     Other Acquisitions of Long-Term Securities, net /5 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0                             21   Net Foreign Acquisition of Long-Term Securities                           (lines 19 and 20): 776.1 1285.6 847.8 1283.2 196.4 100.2 2.4 58.6                             22   Increase in Foreign Holdings of Dollar-Denominated Short-Term                           U.S. Securities and Other Custody Liabilities: /6 196.5 199.9 319.6 180.0 -3.5 12.0 17.5 87.4 23     U.S. Treasury Bills 222.3 142.3 310.6 128.9 -2.9 9.5 -10.2 91.6 24       Private, net 165.3 60.7 141.9 88.4 -2.3 6.6 -29.4 23.8 25       Official, net 57.0 81.6 168.7 40.5 -0.6 2.9 19.2 67.8 26     Other Negotiable Instruments                           and Selected Other Liabilities: /7 -25.8 57.6 9.0 51.1 -0.6 2.5 27.7 -4.2 27       Private, net -27.8 63.7 9.0 56.1 0.2 3.7 27.3 -5.2 28       Official, net 1.9 -6.2 0.0 -5.0 -0.8 -1.2 0.4 0.9                             29   Change in Banks' Own Net Dollar-Denominated Liabilities 244.1 -70.9 317.3 -112.0 -1.7 4.9 -58.3 38.6                             30 Monthly Net Dollar-Denominated Portfolio Inflows (lines 21, 22, and 29) /8 /9 1216.6 1414.5 1484.8 1351.2 191.1 117.1 -38.4 184.5     of  which                   31     Private, net 1085.4 1382.1 1290.7 1331.3 144.6 106.3 -89.8 166.5 32     Official, net 131.2 32.4 194.1 19.9 46.5 10.8 51.5 18.0                                                         /1     Net U.S. sales = Net foreign purchases of U.S. securities (+).                 /2     Includes international and regional organizations.                 /3     The reported division of net U.S. sales of long-term securities between net sales to foreign official institutions and net sales               to other foreign investors is subject to a "transaction bias" described in Frequently Asked Questions 7 and 10.a.4 on the TIC website.   /4     Net transactions in foreign securities by U.S. residents. Foreign purchases of foreign securities = U.S. sales of foreign securities to foreigners.           Thus negative entries indicate net U.S. purchases of foreign securities, or an outflow of capital from the United States; positive entries           indicate net U.S. sales of foreign securities.                 /5     Minus estimated unrecorded principal repayments to foreigners on domestic corporate and agency asset-backed securities (zero after Jan. 2023) +          estimated foreign acquisitions of U.S. equity through stock swaps - estimated U.S. acquisitions of foreign equity through stock swaps +           increase in nonmarketable Treasury Bonds and Notes Issued to Official Institutions and Other Residents of Foreign Countries.      /6     These are primarily data on monthly changes in banks' and broker/dealers' custody liabilities. Data on custody claims are collected             quarterly and published in the TIC website.                 /7     "Selected Other Liabilities" are primarily the foreign liabilities of U.S. customers that are managed by U.S. banks or broker/dealers.     /8     TIC data cover most components of international financial flows, but do not include data on direct investment flows, which are collected           and published by the Department of Commerce's Bureau of Economic Analysis. In addition to the monthly data summarized here, the           TIC collects quarterly data on some banking and nonbanking assets and liabilities. Frequently Asked Question 1 on the TIC website           describes the scope of TIC data collection.                 9/      Series break at February 2023 for lines 1-21 and the dependent lines 30-32; see TIC press releases of March 15 and April 15, 2023.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission today approved an order to grant a limited exemption necessary for the Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and the Fixed Income Clearing Corporation to make their existing cross-margining arrangement available to certain customers with appropriate safeguards.   The order permits joint clearing members of CME and FICC that are dually registered as broker-dealers with the Securities and Exchange Commission and futures commission merchants with the Commission to hold futures customer funds in a commingled customer account at FICC. Prior to today’s exemptive order, only clearing members could cross-margin futures positions in U.S. Treasury securities cleared at CME with cash market positions in U.S. Treasury securities cleared at FICC. "Today's joint action supports both the CFTC's and SEC's broader effort to strengthen the resilience and liquidity of the U.S. Treasury market," said Chairman Michael S. Selig. "By enabling more efficient risk management across related products, this proposal moves us closer toward a more modern, robust market structure." The exemptive order will be available on CFTC.gov and published in the Federal Register. A related SEC exemptive order will be available on SEC.gov and published in the Federal Register.  RELATED LINKS Federal Register (Exemptive Order)

SIFMA today announced it will recognize National Investing Day, observed annually on May 1, as an industry-wide opportunity to highlight the importance of investing and the critical role the effective and resilient capital markets play in supporting long‑term financial security and economic growth. National Investing Day was established in 2025 to promote awareness of the benefits of investing and broaden participation in the capital markets. The Day serves as an opportunity to elevate the role investing plays in helping individuals build wealth over time, plan for retirement, and participate in broader economic growth. National Investing Day underscores the importance of financial literacy, market access, and retirement savings. “Investing is fundamental to helping people achieve their financial goals and supporting a strong U.S. economy,” said Kenneth E. Bentsen, Jr., president and CEO of SIFMA. “National Investing Day is an important opportunity to demonstrate how investing supports long‑term financial security while supporting the growth of our capital markets. We encourage the industry to join us in recognizing this Day.” To support National Investing Day, SIFMA has developed a customizable toolkit designed to help firms engage clients, employees, and communities. The toolkit includes open-source graphics, sample social media content, leadership messaging, and client-facing materials that can be adapted to firm-specific branding and outreach strategies. SIFMA’s participation reflects its broader work to advance financial literacy, strengthen investor protection, and support retirement savings. Through its advocacy and educational initiatives, SIFMA promotes policies and programs that expand access to the capital markets, foster informed decision-making, and help individuals build long-term financial resilience. To celebrate National Investing Day on May 1, students participating in the SIFMA Foundation’s Stock Market Game™ will ring the closing bell at the New York Stock Exchange. For more information about National Investing Day and SIFMA’s efforts to support investors and advocate for resilient and effective capital markets, please visit www.sifma.org.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission today announced the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida entered a consent order against John Fortini for retail fraud, fraud as an associated person of a commodity pool operator, and related regulatory violations. The order finds that Fortini, while serving as an executive with defendant Algo Capital LLC, misappropriated customer funds and made numerous misrepresentations and omissions to customers and prospective customers.  As outlined in the order, Fortini falsely assured customers they could withdraw their funds, even though he knew that some, if not all, customer withdrawal requests were not being honored during the fall of 2022, and he misled them about the firm’s claimed use of a proprietary trading algorithm. In reality, Algo Capital had arranged for Traders Domain FX Ltd. to trade customer funds beginning no later than October 2021. In addition, Fortini ignored several red flags that Traders Domain was engaged in fraudulent activity and not trading customer funds as they claimed. The order further finds, despite understanding the significance, Fortini failed to inform customers of Traders Domain’s inclusion on the CFTC’s Registration Deficient List. [See CFTC Press Release No. 8555-22]  The court ordered Fortini to pay $1,347,867.56 in disgorgement. The court also permanently enjoins Fortini from further violations of the Commodity Exchange Act and Commission regulations, as charged, and imposes permanent trading and registration bans. The consent order resolves all claims against Fortini in the CFTC’s Sept. 30, 2024, enforcement action. The enforcement action against the remaining defendants continues. [See CFTC Press Release No. 8997-24]  The CFTC cautions that disgorgement orders may not result in victims recovering any money lost because defendants may not have sufficient funds or assets. RELATED LINKS Consent Order: John Fortini Order Approving and Entering Consent Decree

Piero Cipollone Member of the ECB's Executive Board Today I will discuss the role of technology in the future of finance.[1] I will seek to outline the conditions needed for technological innovations to genuinely enhance the economic efficiency of the financial system, focusing on tokenisation and distributed ledger technology (DLT) as a case in point. Financial innovation should help capital find its most productive use and risk find its best owner at the lowest possible cost. These efficiency criteria have been used to justify and judge every major wave of innovation in modern finance, from the development of derivatives markets to electronic trading and dematerialisation. The distributional effects of innovation also need to be taken into account – that is, whether the gains from innovation are passed on to borrowers and savers or absorbed along the way. The historical record on this is striking and should make us pause for thought. Since the late 19th century, the financial sector has expanded enormously and technology has made markets more efficient. Yet the cost of connecting a borrower to a saver has barely moved at the aggregate level. The unit cost of financial intermediation in the United States has remained roughly constant, at around 2% of intermediated assets.[2] These estimates also broadly hold for European countries such as Germany, France and the United Kingdom.[3] So the question I would like to address today is whether tokenisation can break with the historical pattern, allowing technical efficiency gains to reach borrowers and savers. I will argue that this is possible because, with tokenisation, we now have a technology that is genuinely different from what came before. It is possible but by no means certain. I will therefore outline the conditions that are necessary to achieve such a positive outcome, including the role that central banks can play in enabling this transformation. The conditions for tokenisation and DLT to deliver genuine efficiency gains Recognising the transformative potential of tokenisation Let me first explain why tokenisation and DLT have the potential to be transformative. Most financial innovations made the existing system more efficient without changing its fundamental architecture. The shift from paper-based to electronic messaging, trading and settlement over the past half-century is the clearest example. Swift transformed cross-border communication between banks by cutting transaction times. Electronic order books replaced trading floors, while settlement cycles were reduced from weeks to days. Each of these innovations made the existing system faster and more reliable. But the underlying architecture – in which trading, clearing, custody and settlement were separated into distinct institutional layers, each with their own infrastructure and intermediaries – remained intact. Even as financial markets have become increasingly sophisticated, the fundamental practice of bookkeeping across ledgers has remained largely unchanged. At each stage of the securities life cycle, banks, brokers, information providers and other market participants continue to play an essential role in intermediation.[4] Tokenisation belongs to a different class of innovation entirely, which economists call general-purpose technology. Rather than improving just one part of a system, these technologies reframe the logic of the system as a whole. By issuing or representing assets in the form of digital tokens[5] that are typically recorded on DLT networks, tokenisation allows the full life cycle of a transaction – issuance, trading, settlement and custody – to take place within a single digital environment that is available 24/7. Tokenisation can provide a single, shared source of truth, avoiding the need to reconcile multiple proprietary ledgers. And it enables processes such as coupon payments to be automated through smart contracts. This has the potential to simplify access to finance, enhance financial services and reduce costs. A system-wide paradigm shift But a defining characteristic of a general-purpose technology is that the associated gains are conditional on the complementary components of a market adopting this technology simultaneously. Electricity is the clearest historical example. It was a transformative technology, but it required an extensive restructuring of production to unlock broad-based productivity increases. As Paul David showed in his seminal analysis of historical technological transitions, factories initially replaced steam engines with dynamos while keeping the existing centralised mechanical power system unchanged.[6] Productivity gains only materialised once factories redesigned their entire workflows and floor plans around the logic of the new technology, adopting individual motors for each piece of equipment and building lighter and modular single-storey plants. Tokenisation could be similarly transformative thanks to its potential to rewire finance. But for the promised gains to materialise, the various components of the financial system need to embrace its new logic. The government bond market illustrates how much the different components complement each other – and why they need to move together. A liquid sovereign bond market requires a secondary market to provide tradability, which requires repo markets so that dealers can manage their inventories[7]. And it requires derivatives so that investors can hedge rate exposure. Finally, all of these components require an adaptive legal framework, central bank liquidity and specialised courts. It is this complex, interlocking system, built up over centuries, that has improved conditions for both borrowers and savers in this market and the efficiency with which they are connected. These complementary components also create a coordination problem. No single component can transform the financial system on its own. This reduces the incentive to move to a new techno-economic paradigm before others do: whoever moves first faces certain costs and highly uncertain pay-offs. So while rational actors may experiment to be ready just in case, the structure of incentives discourages a unilateral move to the new technology.[8] That is why factories continued to add electric dynamos to existing production systems designed for steam power, rather than redesigning these systems entirely. The challenge facing tokenisation is similar. Moreover, some intermediaries have a business model centred on addressing frictions in the system. When intermediation niches are structured in an oligopolistic way, incumbents can extract rents. These rents in turn reduce the incentive to invest in removing frictions. An integrated and competitive market But there is an additional dimension that the history of electricity shines a light on. The coordination problem is not only about whether the system moves, but which configuration it moves to. The US electrical industry of the 1880s was a landscape of incompatible local providers, competing on standards for electrical currents, and fragmented infrastructure that could not interconnect. The war of the currents between Edison’s DC and Westinghouse’s AC was resolved not by the market alone but by standardisation pressure and ultimately regulatory settlement. In the United States, industry associations such as the Institute of Electrical Engineers and the National Electric Light Association played a key role in standardising electrical machinery.[9] In France, Japan and the United Kingdom, governments and public institutions led the electrification drive through a deliberate and organised effort.[10] Institutional settlement preceded the productivity boom of the 1920s and shaped who controlled the infrastructure, on what terms, and who could ultimately capture its gains. With tokenised finance, we face the same pressing issues. There are many conceivable architectures for a DLT ecosystem – a single shared network, multiple interconnected networks, or a combination of the two. Each option involves trade-offs. For instance, a single shared network would, by design, avoid fragmentation and bring together the full value chain of wholesale financial markets. But this would imply that there is only competition at the services level. By contrast, multiple interconnected networks would support competition and innovation at the infrastructure level as well, but would increase the risk of fragmenting liquidity and assets. Independent of the future architecture, common standards will be crucial to ensure market integration and avoid walled gardens. In addition, the network layer should provide all participants with equal and non-discriminatory access. This will eliminate the need to create proprietary infrastructure in order to compete in the market, thereby reducing barriers to entry and increasing contestability. Ultimately, the costs for issuers and investors will fall.[11] The design choices that are being made at this early stage will determine which configuration the system locks into, and whether the gains of tokenisation are broadly distributed. The role of the central bank This brings me to the role of the central bank. In my view, we can make two key contributions to reduce the lag between financial innovation and broad productivity gains. Central bank money and collateral eligibility The first contribution relates to the key role played by central banks in encouraging the financial system to scale up and speed up its embrace of tokenisation. Central banks need to do their part in two core areas: first, as the issuer of central bank money and, second, as the provider of liquidity against collateral. Specifically, tokenised central bank money is necessary to offer a risk-free settlement asset in tokenised markets. And tokenised assets need to be eligible as collateral that can be mobilised in monetary policy operations. This will improve the liquidity of DLT-based assets, which is critical to making digital finance more scalable and attractive.  Without tokenised central bank money as a settlement asset, every transaction in the new ecosystem would need to be settled using an instrument that (i) carries credit risk and (ii) does not provide the finality that only central bank money can. The private sector has sounded this warning: without a trusted public settlement anchor, sellers of a tokenised security may receive payment in an asset they are not comfortable holding. Tokenised central bank money is necessary for the market to expand and reach a tipping point – that is, the critical mass where it becomes rational for all the complementary components to adopt the new technology, thereby creating a new sustainable tokenised finance ecosystem. In 2024 the Eurosystem conducted exploratory work involving 50 trials across nine jurisdictions, with participants conducting transactions worth roughly €1.6 billion. It showed that central bank money could be used to settle DLT-based transactions and compared possible technical solutions.[12] The lessons learned have shaped the Eurosystem’s strategy. From September, we will offer tokenised central bank money settlement for DLT-based transactions as part of our Pontes project. This will provide a safe asset and a trusted common anchor that tokenised markets can use to grow at the speed and scale Europe needs. By offering a tokenised settlement asset in euro and issued by the central bank, we will also safeguard our monetary sovereignty, thereby reducing the risk that tokenisation leads to a growing dependency on non-European settlement assets.[13] In the area of collateral eligibility, for Eurosystem credit operations we have, since the end of March, accepted marketable assets issued in central securities depositories using DLT. These assets will be mobilised as collateral in line with the Eurosystem’s existing collateral management practices, like any other marketable asset. We are also exploring ways to expand eligibility to assets that are issued using DLT and not represented in eligible securities settlement systems.[14] The central bank as a catalyst The second contribution the central bank can make relates to its role as a catalyst in the market – a role similar to that of the electricity regulators that standardised equipment and set the terms under which the grid would be open. Without a vision for an integrated and competitive tokenised ecosystem and further investigation into what it requires in terms of architecture and standards, the tokenised market risks becoming a landscape of non-interoperable networks and standards that fragment liquidity, limit competition and stifle innovation. This is precisely why we have developed the Appia roadmap[15], which we published in March. Appia sets out the longer-term vision for a European tokenised financial ecosystem. Through a combination of analytical and practical work, it aims to deliver a blueprint by 2028 in cooperation with all relevant private and public stakeholders. The topics we will tackle with Appia are structured around six building blocks ranging from technical standards and interoperability to monetary policy implementation, cross-border connectivity and the legal and regulatory foundations. Appia will use our policy objectives to assess whether a single European shared ledger, multiple interconnected networks, or a combination of both is the best solution for the network layer[16]. It will also consider whether the Eurosystem would provide its core services on a network it operates directly or on other networks where governance is shared with other parties. Appia will help shape enhancements of Pontes, while at the same time benefiting from the operational lessons learned from Pontes. Taken together, Pontes and Appia could be seen as the institutional equivalent of the solution to the electrification coordination problem: a trusted common infrastructure that no single participant controls and that is organised based on terms that enable the surrounding system to move together in a configuration that distributes economic gains broadly. Conclusion Let me conclude. It’s clear that tokenisation and DLT represent a different type of financial innovation – one that has the potential to deliver efficiency gains unmatched by previous waves of technological change. What’s less clear, however, is how long it will take for tokenisation and DLT to be widely adopted and whether the resulting market structure will foster integration and competition. That question is, at its core, an institutional one. Whether tokenisation will create a financial system that reduces the gap between savers and borrowers depends on the policy choices we make, just like how the electrical industry was shaped by the regulatory and standardisation choices made in the early 20th century. We have a window of opportunity to ensure the foundational architecture of tokenised finance encourages an integrated and competitive ecosystem – anchored in central bank money – that truly improves the way in which the economy is financed. This will determine whether tokenisation will spark a transformation that genuinely reduces the cost of finance. Thank you. I would like to thank Antoine Lallour, Cyril Max Neumann and Jean-Francois Jamet for their help in preparing this speech, as well as Alexander Duering and Thomas Vlassopoulos for their comments. See Philippon, T. (2015), “Has the US Finance Industry Become Less Efficient? On the Theory and Measurement of Financial Intermediation”, American Economic Review, Vol. 105, No 4, pp. 1408-1438, April, and Philippon, T. (2016), Finance, productivity, and distribution, Brookings, 1 October. To estimate the unit cost, the income of the finance industry is divided by the quantity of intermediated assets. The connection of borrowers and savers will be more efficient for some subsectors or specific markets and instruments than for others. Bazot, G. (2018), “Financial Consumption and the Cost of Finance: Measuring Financial Efficiency in Europe (1950-2007)”, Journal of the European Economic Association, Vol. 16, No 1, pp. 123-160, February.  Cipollone, P. (2024), “Towards a digital capital markets union”, keynote speech at the Bundesbank Symposium on the Future of Payments, Frankfurt am Main, 7 October. Digital tokens are entries in a database that are recorded digitally and can contain information and functionality within the tokens themselves. See Bank for International Settlements (2024), Tokenisation in the context of money and other assets: concepts and implications for central banks, Joint report by the Bank for International Settlements and Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures, October. David, P.A. (1990), “The Dynamo and the Computer: An Historical Perspective on the Modern Productivity Paradox”, The American Economic Review, Vol. 80, No 2, May, pp. 355-361. In a repo transaction, one party sells securities to another party with an agreement to buy them back at an agreed-upon price. Repo markets allow some market participants to source required short-term funding or collateral and others to undertake short-term, low-risk investment of cash. See Financial Stability Board (2026), Vulnerabilities in Government Bond-backed Repo Markets, 4 February. Milgrom, P. and Roberts, J. (1995), “Complementarities and fit – Strategy, structure, and organizational change in manufacturing”, Journal of Accounting and Economics, Vol. 19, No 2-3, March-May, pp. 179-208. Bradley, Jr., R.L. (1996), “The Origins of Political Electricity: Market Failure or Political Opportunism?”, Energy Law Journal, Vol. 17, No 1, pp. 59-102. That said, the Great East Japan Earthquake in March 2011 highlighted a critical structural weakness in Japan’s power infrastructure: the East-West electrical divide. This divide dates back to when Japan first electrified. Tokyo imported 50 Hz generators from Germany while Osaka imported 60 Hz generators from General Electric, resulting in incompatibilities which persist to the present day. Agur, I., Villegas-Bauer, G., Mancini-Griffoli, T. and Martinez Peria, M.S. (2025), “Tokenization and Financial Market Inefficiencies”, Fintech Notes, No 2025/001, IMF, 29 January. ECB (2025), Bridging innovation and stability: the Eurosystem’s exploratory work on new technologies for wholesale central bank money settlement, June. Rey, H. (2025), “Stablecoins, Tokens, and Global Dominance”, F&D Magazine, September. ECB (2026), “ECB paves way for acceptance of DLT-based assets as eligible Eurosystem collateral”, press release, 27 January. ECB (2026), Appia – paving the way for a future-ready, integrated financial ecosystem leveraging tokenisation and DLT. With Appia, the Eurosystem is seeking to leverage DLT to achieve the following objectives: (i) ensure the effectiveness of monetary policy and financial stability and the smooth functioning of payment systems by maintaining central bank money as the anchor of a two-tier monetary system; (ii) foster a more integrated, competitive and innovative payments and securities ecosystem through efficient infrastructures for financial markets; (iii) support strategic autonomy and increased resilience; and (iv) ensure the relevance of the euro as an international currency.

Summary: Institutional investors managing over $3,500 billion report a modest return of risk appetite in April, with the Risk Appetite Index rising from -16% in March to +7%, marking the first positive expectation of near-term market returns in three months. However, confidence remains subdued as fund managers navigate geopolitical uncertainties, with nearly one-in-four respondents expecting energy and supply disruptions from the Middle East war to persist beyond 2026.  Chris Williamson, Chief Business Economist and Executive Director at S&P Global Market Intelligence said:  “The announcement of the Middle East ceasefire has helped steady investor nerves, encouraging a modest revival of risk appetite among fund managers. However, confidence remains low on balance, and views on the near-term market direction are more varied than at any time for more than a year, underscoring the wide range of opinions on the duration of the conflict and its impact on energy markets and supply chains. “Besides defensive plays, any enthusiasm for stocks is largely focused on basic materials and energy, reflecting scope for higher margins amid war-related supply constraints. Investors, meanwhile, continue to shun consumer-focused stocks, having reined in their expectations for economic growth and revised their interest rate outlooks thanks to the surge in energy prices and its anticipated impact on inflation.”  Key highlights from the report include: The IMI's Risk Appetite Index surveyed nearly 300 institutional investors and revealed a significant recovery from March's risk aversion, climbing 23 percentage points to reach +7% in April, coinciding with the Middle East ceasefire announcement, though remaining substantially below year-start levels amid persistent war-related concerns. Basic materials emerged as the top investor preference for the first time in nearly five years, alongside energy stocks, driven by bullishness over constrained supply and price expectations, while investors demonstrated pronounced bearishness toward real estate (at a 10-month sentiment low), consumer staples, and consumer discretionary stocks. Commodities have become the most preferred asset class in April as Middle East conflict drives price gain expectations, while corporate credit now represents the least-favored asset class with pessimism reaching its highest level since October 2022, and sovereign debt also faces renewed bearishness. Regional equity preferences show US equities displacing Rest of Asia at the top of year-end expectations, with Latin American stocks advancing from sixth to third place, while EU and UK equities face their most negative investor sentiment since October 2023, reflecting deteriorating confidence in European markets. Concerns over the global macroeconomic environment reached their highest levels since September 2024, with views on US economic impact remaining negative for a second consecutive month and central bank policy shifting into negative territory for the first time in 10 months due to increasingly hawkish interest rate outlooks. To receive a copy of the full report and/or to connect with a spokesperson for commentary, please respond to this email.  Thank you in advance for citing S&P Global Market Intelligence, should you choose to use any of this information in your reporting.      

The MIAX Exchange Group will participate in the 2026 SIFMA BCP Testing on Saturday, October 24, 2026. All Members that are required to test with MIAX Options, MIAX Pearl Options, MIAX Emerald Options, MIAX Sapphire Options and/or MIAX Pearl Equities Exchanges in accordance with Regulation Systems Compliance and Integrity (Regulation SCI) have been notified. However, all Members are encouraged to test. All Exchange designated Members are required to maintain connection to the MIAX Disaster Recovery (DR) environment for a 12-month period after receiving notification for mandatory testing. All Exchanges will operate out of the Chicago (CH4) DR site during the scheduled test.Designation Standards - Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Plans Testing Member:  MIAX Options Exchange MIAX_Options_RC_2025-107 MIAX PEARL Options Exchange MIAX_PEARL_RC_2025-109 MIAX Emerald Options Exchange MIAX_Emerald_RC_2025-106 MIAX Sapphire Options Exchange MIAX_Sapphire_RC_2025-129 MIAX PEARL Equities Exchange MIAX_PEARL_Equities_RC_2025-14 For test day support, to coordinate participation or to arrange connectivity testing, please contact: MIAX Trading Operations at TradingOperations@miaxglobal.com or (609) 897-7302 Regulatory inquiries should be directed to Regulatory@miaxglobal.com or (609)-897-7309 Pre-Testing: Availability to the DR environments for each of the MIAX Exchanges will be available: Saturday, September 26, 2026, 8:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. EST Application layer connectivity testing Saturday, October 10, 2026, 8:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. EST Application layer connectivity testing Monday, October 19, 2026 through Friday, October 23, 2026, 8:00 a.m. – 5:30 p.m. EST Application layer connectivity testing MIAX Options, MIAX Pearl Options, MIAX Emerald Options, & MIAX Sapphire Options Exchanges  BCP Testing RequirementsMembers mandated to participate in accordance with Regulation SCI are obligated, at a minimum, to demonstrate the following:Electronic Exchange Members (EEM) Send at least two orders in any of the options listed below Receive at least one execution in any of the options listed below Market Makers (MM) MIAX Options Exchange: Send at least one two-sided quote in any of the options listed below Receive at least one execution in any of the options listed below MIAX Pearl Options Exchange: Send at least one two-sided order in any of the options listed below Receive at least one execution in any of the options listed below MIAX Emerald Options Exchange: Send at least one two-sided quote in any of the options listed below Receive at least one execution in any of the options listed below MIAX Sapphire Options Exchange: Send at least one two-sided quote in any of the options listed below Receive at least one execution in any of the options listed below Options: AAPL–Dec 18 26-C-260.00 AAPL–Dec 18 26-P-260.00 BAC–Jan 15 27-C-50.00 BAC–Jan 15 27-P-50.00 GE–Nov 20 26-C-340.00 GE–Nov 20 26-P-340.00 MSFT-Dec 18 26-C-400.00 MSFT–Dec 18 26-P-400.00 SPY–Dec 31 26-C-686.00 SPY–Dec 31 26-P-686.00 MIAX Pearl Equities Exchange BCP Testing RequirementsEquity Members mandated to participate in accordance with Regulation SCI are obligated, at a minimum, to demonstrate the following: Send at least two orders in any of the equity symbols listed below Receive at least one execution in any of the equity symbols listed below Equities Symbol - NTGR Symbol - ZVZZT Symbol - NTEST October 25, 2025 Test Day Timeline: 08:30 - Firms can connect to the Trading Systems and enter Orders and Quotes 09:15 - Live Quote Window will open 09:30 - Opening 13:00 - Closing Test Completion: Once a firm has completed testing, please confirm with MIAX Trading Operations at TradingOperations@miaxglobal.com

Fiserv, Inc. (NASDAQ: FISV), a leading global provider of payments and financial services technology, announced today that Finxact from Fiserv has been named the best SaaS for FinTech at The 2026 FinTech Awards, recognizing the platform’s role in enabling modern, cloud‑native banking infrastructure at scale. Finxact is an API‑first core banking platform that provides financial institutions with a cloud-native, real‑time system of record for accounts and transaction processing engine. With over 30 million accounts live, Finxact enables banks, fintechs and customer-centric platforms with large, loyal user bases to build and scale modern embedded financial services through a secure, cloud-native architecture. “This recognition underlines what financial institutions are asking for — a core foundation they can rely on as they evolve on their own terms,” said Frank Sanchez, Head of Finxact and Vice Chairman, Fiserv. “Finxact provides the flexibility to introduce new capabilities, serve clients in new ways, and meet rising expectations without disruption to the banking business or the people who depend on these services.” “We highlighted ‘trust’ as a key theme for the year within FinTech. Exciting feats of innovation draw a crowd, but it’s trust earned and demonstrated through tangible outcomes, outstanding results, and external validation through awards, that keeps users coming back for more,” James Williams, CEO of The Cloud Awards, said: “Fiserv has done an excellent job in demonstrating to our judges the perfect balance between innovation and trust.” Finxact features a microservices‑based architecture, real-time continuous processing, and full access to all data and transactions via open APIs, positioning clients to integrate seamlessly with modern applications and make optimal use of AI. Finxact, with its asset-agnostic account structure, extensible design and temporal data model, enables banks, fintechs, and customer‑centric platforms with large, loyal user bases to build and scale modern embedded financial services through a secure, cloud‑native architecture. The FinTech Awards are operated by The Cloud Awards, an international awards body recognizing innovation and achievement across the global financial technology landscape. Winners were selected from organizations across North America, Europe, and APAC, spanning a broad range of FinTech use cases and industries. About The FinTech Awards   The FinTech Awards focuses on the major innovations in the world of financial technology, including personal and corporate banking, insurance, and wealth management, business finance processes, and FinTech use within a selection of sectors, across 23 categories.

EuroCTP, the European initiative delivering the EU’s first real-time pre- and post-trade Consolidated Tape for shares and ETFs, has selected Exegy, the global leader in high-performance market data and trading technology, as its core technology partner. Under this collaboration, Exegy’s ticker plant technology will power the data normalization and consolidation engine of the platform, contributing to a robust and resilient consolidated tape.   Following its official selection by the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) in late 2025, EuroCTP is building a unified, real-time view of trading activity across more than 130 European trading venues and reporting platforms. The service, designed by EuroCTP, is targeted for a July 2026 launch and will provide the official European best bid and offer (EBBO) as well as comprehensive access to European trade data, ultimately enhancing transparency and price discovery for all market participants.  Exegy’s solution will act as the market data engine for EuroCTP’s downstream applications, integrating with its website, data lake, and real-time data distribution infrastructure. The high-capacity, FPGA-accelerated Ticker Plant is designed to consume pre-trade and post-trade data from trading venues and APAs, then compute the EBBO, ensuring the highest level of accuracy and speed for market participants.  “Exegy is honoured to provide the state-of-the-art foundation for this transformative project,” said David Taylor, CEO of Exegy. “Building an Equities consolidated tape across the fragmented European landscape requires proven experience in mission-critical roles and technology that provides the necessary level of capacity and reliable performance. By delivering purpose-built FPGA appliances and providing a comprehensive 24/7, ‘Follow the Sun’ managed service model, we are helping EuroCTP create a robust, efficient, and future-proof platform that supports the next generation of growth in European capital markets.”  “Selecting Exegy as a strategic technology partner was a critical milestone in our mission to foster transparency and equal access to market data,” said Eglantine Desautel, CEO of EuroCTP. “EuroCTP is committed to delivering a consolidated tape that serves retail and institutional investors alike. Exegy’s proven track record, building on its history of powering the Canadian Equities Consolidated Tape and supporting a large number of industry participants with high industry standards and operational resilience, is crucial to delivering on our promise of a more integrated EU Single Market.”   Building on a collaboration initiated in 2024, including the successful development of a prototype consolidated data feed featuring the novel EBBO computation, EuroCTP and Exegy are working closely together as European trading and trade publication venues are onboarded ahead of the go-live later this year. 

Crypto will be regulated in the UK from October 2027. The FCA is finalising the wider cryptoasset regime, with rules to be published this summer. Parliament has now confirmed which cryptoasset activities will fall within the scope of regulation. Building on that, the FCA is consulting on new guidance to help firms understand how they might be affected by the regulatory regime for cryptoassets. The FCA is seeking feedback on its interpretation of the following regulated cryptoasset activities: issuing qualifying stablecoin  operating trading platforms  dealing and arranging deals in qualifying cryptoassets safeguarding cryptoassets  staking The proposed guidance supports the FCA’s aim for an open, sustainable and competitive crypto market people can trust. Crypto firms will be able to start applying for authorisation from September 2026. Ahead of this, the FCA is providing crypto firms with support on how to apply and to understand how the future regime could work. Until the new regime comes into force, crypto is largely unregulated except for financial promotions and financial crime purposes. As with all high-risk investments, people should only put in what they can afford to lose. Background Read the full consultation. The consultation closes on 3 June 2026. This publication marks another step towards crypto regulation in the UK, following the making of the statutory instrumentLink is external  in Parliament on 4 February 2026. The FCA has set out the timeline for crypto regulation in its crypto roadmap. The FCA has consulted on stablecoin issuance and cryptoasset custody (CP25/14), prudential rules (CP25/15 and CP25/42), the application of the FCA Handbook (CP25/25 and CP26/4), regulating cryptoasset activities (CP25/40), and admissions and disclosures and market abuse (CP25/41). The FCA’s consultations on rules for the future cryptoasset regime are substantively complete, with policy statements to be published this summer. This perimeter guidance consultation complements that work by clarifying which activities fall within scope, with a final policy statement due in autumn. The authorisations gateway opens on 30 September. The FCA is hosting authorisation-focussed webinars to support prospective applicants, with an introduction to the upcoming regulatory changes and an intro to anti-money laundering regulations available on demand. The next webinar, on 29 April, focuses on the Senior Managers and Certification Regime. Later this year, the FCA will consult on decentralised finance (DeFi) guidance and separately on operational resilience guidance for firms using distributed ledger technology (DLT). It will also consult on updates to the Financial Crime Guide relevant to cryptoasset firms. Find out more about requirements firms must comply with.

CME Group, the world's leading derivatives marketplace, today announced plans to expand its Equity Index Dividend suite on May 11, with the addition of Mid-curve options on S&P 500 Annual Dividend Index futures, alongside Nasdaq-100 and Russell 2000 Quarterly Dividend Index futures, pending regulatory review. "Amid shifting interest rates and economic uncertainty, managing dividend exposure has become a strategic necessity for investors," said Joe Hickey, Global Head of Equity Products at CME Group. "Trading in our dividend products has increased more than 50% year-over-year. To meet this increased demand, we are launching these new Mid-curve options on S&P 500 Annual Index futures and Quarterly Dividend futures on the Nasdaq-100 and Russell 2000 to provide clients with additional, and even more precise tools to mitigate index-specific risk and hedge around critical dividend events." These new products are the latest addition to CME Group's deeply liquid Equity Index Dividend suite, which includes: Options on S&P 500 Annual Dividend futures; S&P 500 Annual and Quarterly Dividend Index futures; Nasdaq-100 Annual Dividend Index futures; and Russell 2000 Annual Dividend Index futures. Year-to-date trading highlights include: Dividend futures and options open interest of 860,000 contracts, up 27% year-over-year. S&P 500 Quarterly Dividend Index futures average daily volume (ADV) up 21% year-over-year. Options on S&P Annual Dividend Index futures ADV of 3,900 contracts, up 80% year-over-year. These products will be listed on and subject to the rules of CME. For more information, please visit cmegroup.com/dividends.

On 22 January 2026, the transmission system operators (TSOs) of the Core capacity calculation region submitted a proposal to their national regulatory authorities to amend the day-ahead capacity calculation methodology. As the national regulators could not reach an agreement, the proposal was referred to ACER on 30 March 2026 under the Capacity Calculation and Congestion Management Regulation. What is the methodology about? The Core day-ahead capacity calculation methodology (initially established by ACER in 2019 and first implemented in June 2022) aims to maximise the capacity made available to the market while maintaining operational security. This methodology is based on a flow-based approach, meaning cross-zonal capacities are calculated by taking into account transmission networks’ physical constraints. This approach significantly improves the efficiency of cross-zonal capacity allocation, as it better reflects real network conditions. Why change the rules? Core TSOs propose to amend the methodology to better harmonise it with other electricity market timeframes (i.e. intraday and long-term capacity calculation) operating in the same region. The main purpose of this amendment is to remove long-term allocations from the day-ahead capacity calculation. Removing long-term allocations from the day-ahead capacity calculation decouples operational safety from long-term capacity volumes, allowing their determination without direct operational security constraints. This will improve the efficiency of the process, as long-term capacities will be calculated independently, reflecting the separation between the day-ahead and long-term frameworks. What are the next steps? ACER, in cooperation with relevant energy regulators and TSOs, will reach a decision by 30 September 2026. Read more.

Ondo, Clearstream, and 360X partner to bring tokenized securities into regulated market infrastructure Ondo tokenized stocks and ETFs are now live on 360X, marking the largest listing on the venue to date Clearstream partnership will enable custody, settlement, and collateralization of tokenized assets within institutional workflows Partnership establishes a foundation for global distribution of tokenized securities, with future expansion into EU-listed assets Ondo Finance, Clearstream, and 360X today announced a partnership to connect traditional financial markets with onchain infrastructure built on public, permissionless blockchains. Starting now, the firms will combine their strengths across the full lifecycle of tokenized securities spanning trading, custody, settlement, and collateral management forming a unified framework for tokenized assets within regulated financial infrastructure. In the first phase, Ondo tokenized stocks and ETFs are now live on 360X, the regulated digital asset trading venue backed by Deutsche Börse Group. Broker-dealers and institutional investors across Europe can access and trade these assets within a market environment that meets the EU’s high regulatory standards. The assets are issued on public, permissionless blockchains, including Ethereum, Solana, and BNB Chain. In the subsequent phase, Ondo tokenized assets will be integrated into custody, settlement, post-trade infrastructure and collateral pool of Deutsche Börse Group’s post-trade business Clearstream, enabling institutional investors to access these products similarly to existing workflows, alongside the added benefits of onchain assets. Ondo also plans to tokenize EU-listed instruments on the Ondo Global Markets platform, with Clearstream supporting the custody of the underlying assets. Equally, Clearstream will make assets it holds in custody in tokenized form available to Ondo for distribution to its existing vast network of clients globally (outside the U.S.). As part of the first phase, the initial listing on 360X includes AAPLon, AMZNon, CRCLon, GOOGLon, METAon, MSFTon, NVDAon, TSLAon, SPYon, and QQQon – the largest tokenized securities bulk listing on 360X to date. This launch follows Ondo Global Markets’ recent regulatory approval to offer tokenized stocks and ETFs across 30 European countries in the EU and EEA. The approval enables access for more than 500 million investors to regulated, onchain exposure to U.S. markets. Together, Ondo, 360X, and Clearstream are advancing issuance, custody, trading and collateralization of tokenized assets across global financial markets. Matthieu de Vergnes, MD, Global Head of Institutional at Ondo Finance, said: “By collaborating with Clearstream and 360X we're excited to see Ondo Global Markets become part of the core infrastructure underpinning European institutional markets. Having Ondo tokenized assets custodied within Clearstream's network means institutions can access the benefits of onchain securities through the same trusted infrastructure they already rely on. This is a major turning point for the adoption of tokenized securities within regulated markets and enables the largest institutions across Europe to enter the onchain economy.” Carlo Kölzer, CEO of 360X, 360T and Global Head of FX & Digital Assets at Deutsche Börse Group said: “The listing of Ondo’s first 10 tokenized stocks and ETFs on our trading venue allows us to broaden the range of digital assets accessible to our clients. This integration utilizes our robust infrastructure enabling participants to trade, settle, and hold onchain assets, while meeting the specific technical and oversight requirements of our institutional participants.” Jens Hachmeister, Head of Issuer Services & New Digital Markets at Clearstream, said: “Together with our partners, Clearstream is bridging traditional and digital assets to build a more efficient, future-proof market. By enabling seamless access to tokenized securities in a regulated environment, we are expanding the choices for investors and paving the way for a more integrated financial ecosystem.”