'Inching Toward Dark Pool Reporting'

By: Ray Pellecchia

File Under: NYSE

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Both Traders Magazine and the Wall Street Journal's MarketBeat blog report this afternoon that Goldman Sachs Electronic Trading will begin reporting volume executed on its dark pool based on single-counted matched executions. So there is some movement concerning one of the SEC's expressed concerns, namely the lack of uniform reporting standards among dark pools.

Again, more to come on this issue.

"Inching Toward Dark Pool Reporting" (Traders) Excerpt:

Last week Goldman Sachs Electronic Trading told clients it would begin reporting volume executed in Sigma X, its dark pool, based on single-counted matched executions. This is a departure from how Goldman has been calculating Sigma X volume. Dark pool operators generally are now mulling their options after the Securities and Exchange Commission expressed concern over the lack of reporting standards.

"Without an absolute industry protocol, we're advocating doing what exchanges have been doing for a very long time: reporting single-counted matched-only volume," said Dave Johnsen, vice president for Sigma X business development at Goldman. "If everyone else puts themselves on the same metric, the dark-pool numbers will add up to 100 percent of dark-pool volume."

"Light is Coming to Dark Pools" (MarketBeat) Excerpt:

Dark-pool administrators be warned: the regulators are coming.

It may not have been Paul Revere’s historic ride to Lexington and Concord, but recent comments from U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Mary Schapiro carried just as loudly to those running non-displayed markets. These opaque trading centers have faced a steady stream of criticism from exchanges, market makers and retail investors, who claim they have been hurt by dark pools’ proliferation. But since these pools provide added liquidity to the market, regulators have been leery to interfere - until now.

Reference to the American Revolutionary War, as Independence Day approaches next weekend, duly noted.