LSE shut CurveGlobal, its failed challenge to Europe's bond futures incumbents

CurveGlobal ran a European derivatives exchange for bond and interest-rate futures, majority-owned by London Stock Exchange Group.

That seven of the world's biggest banks, the LSE and Cboe, with £30M and cheap trading, could peel Europe's fixed-income futures volume away from ICE and Deutsche Börse

£30M initial injection in 2016 from seven investment banks, the LSE and Cboe; £20M second round in 2018; £11M more from LSE in 2019, lifting its stake to 44%

Launched in 2016 — codenamed Project Rita, after the Groundhog Day character Bill Murray fails to woo — by seven of the world's biggest investment banks together with the LSE and Cboe Global Markets, to challenge the dominance of Deutsche Börse and ICE in European fixed-income derivatives.

The venture repeatedly needed more money: £20M in 2018, then £11M from the LSE in 2019 (stake to 44%). Even free trading and monthly cash incentives failed to move volume; US exchanges CME and Nasdaq had already abandoned the same fight in 2017. CurveGlobal lost £4M in 2020, by which time the LSE's new management had switched its own attention to data with the $27B Refinitiv acquisition.

Announced September 2021: trading ceases at the end of January 2022. German debt futures and long-dated UK gilt futures stopped immediately for lack of open positions; three-month Sonia futures run until January to help the Libor transition; open positions settle in cash at LCH.

Futures liquidity pools are self-reinforcing: traders open and close positions where everyone else trades, so a sub-scale venue can't win volume back with price incentives alone.

The LSE's own priorities moved on — under new management it spent $27B on Refinitiv and pivoted from derivatives trading to data.

Two prior challengers (CME, Nasdaq) had already quit the same market in 2017, signalling how hard the incumbency was to crack.

Exchange liquidity is winner-take-all: traders concentrate futures where counterparties already are, so challengers need a regulatory or structural event, not incentives, to break an incumbent.

CurveGlobal's trader incentive scheme was terminated early, and the LSE's ambition in European derivatives died with the venue; the group's strategic centre of gravity moved to market data after Refinitiv.