The battle for supremacy among stock exchange operators heated up in a salvo of announcements: a merger between London and Toronto, and advanced talks by NYSE Euronext and Deutsche Boerse.
Within hours, the global landscape of exchanges shifted.
The London Stock Exchange and its new Canadian partner TMX Group, which operates the Toronto exchange, unveiled a deal to create one of the world's biggest trading platforms, which will dominate the raw materials and energy sectors.
Financial markets then heard from the transatlantic NYSE Euronext and Deutsche Boerse, which manages the Frankfurt exchange, that they were in "advanced discussions" on a merger.
Some analysts already have sounded alarms, such as Jon Ogg at 24/7 Wall St.com, who warned consolidation could result in "too few players that are too powerful."
