FCA proposes 50:50 split of UK equity tape income, with 4.5x weighting for smaller venues

The proposal

The FCA published CP26/39 on 29 October. It follows the July 2026 policy statement (CP26/31), which confirmed that the UK equity consolidated tape provider (CTP) will have to share part of its income with the firms that supply its data. The FCA’s earlier consultation on the tape framework, CP25/31, had not proposed income sharing.

The FCA says there are two stages. The size of the share will be set in its five-year Concession Agreement with the CTP, and the FCA will confirm that in a Feedback Statement in early 2027. CP26/39 covers the second stage: Handbook rules on how that share is divided among contributors.

How the income would be split

The FCA proposes splitting the shared income pool in half:

• 50% to all contributors of post-trade data. This half goes to all trading venues and APAs that contributed post-trade data, in proportion to “their share of the total value of all trades submitted” to the tape in the relevant period. Where an APA reports a trade on behalf of a trading venue, the venue would receive the income for that trade.
• 50% to lit order book and auction venues. The other half goes to “trading venues operating CLOB and periodic auction trading systems only”, in proportion to their value traded on those systems.

Trades flagged as non-price forming (NPFT) or as not contributing to price discovery (TNCP) are excluded from both calculations. The FCA says it wants to reward venues that send pre-trade data, since they “will incur additional operational complexity”. It also wants to encourage “meaningfully executable lit liquidity”. The CTP’s measurement period could not be longer than 12 months.

Using data from BMLL Technologies and its own analysis, the FCA estimates that a straight 50:50 model would give 59.2% of distributed income to CLOB and periodic auction systems, 31.6% to APAs and 9.2% to other trading systems.

The smaller-venue weighting

The FCA also proposes multiplying by 4.5 the value of trades reported by smaller venues. It would define a smaller venue as one whose trades account for “less than 5% of the value of trades” provided to the tape, excluding NPFT and TNCP trades. The FCA says the weighting would apply to all current UK SME growth markets.

The FCA estimates the weighting would “roughly triple the proportion of total income received by smaller venues, from 11.8% to 34.6%”. Under its model, CLOB and periodic auction systems would receive 60.4%, APAs 24.9% and other trading systems 14.7%. That would cut the APA share by 6.7 percentage points compared with the unweighted model.

The CP says the proposal is “In line with the EU”, but only the multiplier is the same. The EU’s 4.5x weighting applies to SME growth markets and regulated markets whose trades account for less than 1% of total EU trading volumes each year. The FCA proposes a threshold of 5% of value traded, which it says is “more appropriate” given “the relative size of the UK market”. The FCA also notes that in the EU, these smaller venues do not have to provide data to the tape unless they meet certain conditions. For more on the EU tapes, see our report on ESMA’s 2027 work programme.

Cutting payments for poor data

The CTP would reduce payments to a contributor that:

• repeatedly fails to provide required data, or repeatedly provides data that the CTP identifies as incomplete;
• breaches “the daily 95% confidence interval for latency”;
• no longer meets the minimum transmission protocol requirements in MAR 9 Annex 11;
• no longer meets its clock synchronisation requirements.

Payments would not be cut if the contributor can show “extenuating circumstances”. The FCA gives periods of heightened volatility with very high trading volumes as an example.

The CTP would set its own threshold for what counts as “repeated”. If respondents want a fixed rule, the FCA says it would be minded to use “3 out of 5 consecutive days, or at least once a week for at least 3 weeks within a month”.

Any reduction would be pro-rated by the number of days affected, and the money withheld would be redistributed to other contributors. The CTP would have to tell a contributor about a breach within 2 business days. The contributor would then have 2 weeks to ask for information or provide evidence.

Incident reporting for all CTPs

The second part of the CP covers all consolidated tape providers, not just the equity CTP. The FCA proposes amending SUP 15.18 to bring CTPs into its enhanced operational incident reporting regime. Under that regime, firms submit an initial report “within 24 hours”, send intermediate updates and file a final report “usually within 30 working days of the incident being resolved”.

If an incident meets the thresholds in both SUP 15.18 and the existing MAR 9 rules (MAR 9.2B.4R and 9.2B.6R), the CTP would report it through SUP 15.18 only. A new MAR 9 rule would require a CTP to notify the FCA “immediately” if a matter is urgent and it cannot provide its service within normal hours of operation.

Timetable

Comments are due by 17 December 2026. The FCA aims to publish a policy statement in spring 2027. By early 2027 it also intends to publish a policy statement on systematic internaliser quotes in the tape, along with tender documents and a draft Concession Agreement. It says it intends the CTP to “start operating in 2027 or early 2028”.

Why it matters

Analysis. The 50:50 split with a 4.5x multiplier is a policy choice about UK market structure as well as data economics. Compared with an unweighted model, it moves income from APAs, which carry OTC and SI reporting, towards smaller venues, including SME growth markets.

For market practitioners at venues and APAs, the payment-cut rules matter as much as the split. Latency, completeness and clock synchronisation all affect income. The CTP’s rulebook, which it would develop with its users and consultative committee, will decide where the “repeatedly” threshold sits.

Two figures are not yet known: the overall share of CTP income that will be paid out, and the CTP’s revenue. Until the Concession Agreement sets the first, the percentages above describe how the pool would be divided, not its size.

What we are watching

• The Feedback Statement in early 2027 that sets the share of CTP income to be distributed.
• Whether larger venues and APAs push back on the 5% threshold or the 4.5x multiplier.
• The tender documents and draft Concession Agreement due by early 2027.