Deutsche Borse is in talks to take over the London Stock Exchange Group
Deutsche Borse is in talks to take over the LondonStock Exchange Group, in a megadeal that wouldcreate a European champion presiding over many of the world’s leading financial markets.
Shares in the 215-year-old institution located in the heart of the City of London rose morethan 13 per cent as it confirmed the two groups were discussing what it claimed would be a“merger of equals”.
The move echoes previous efforts in the past two decades to fashion the two exchanges into asingle entity. Under Xavier Rolet’s leadership during the past six years, the LSE has gone fromdefensive prey to challenging its counterpart for the crown as Europe’s largest marketinfrastructure provider by market capitalisation.
The talks are likely to attract scrutiny from politicians, regulators and competitors as they comeat a time of heated debate in Britain over whether it should leave the EU.
Given the intense consolidation of exchanges in recent years, global regulators will alsoprobe the companies over the dominant role they would have in trading and clearingderivatives. The boards believed it would be “an industry-defining combination”, the LSE said.
The all-share deal would see Deutsche Borse own 54.4 per cent of a combined group and LSEshareholders controlling the remainder.
For Deutsche Borse, this is just the latest attempt to become a more global force. It first triedto combine with the LSE in 2000. The deal would have ramifications across the Atlantic as itwould threaten to marginalise the CME Group, the US’s most influential exchange operator,in Europe.