15.V Conclusion about the ISD

The ISD gave Member States the choice to decide whether, and if so to which extent, they wanted to use data pricing-regulation. No harmonised ISD-rules were in place governing the price of equity pre- and post-trade data and FESCO also provided no guidance. CESR provided broad standards on a ‘reasonable commercial basis’ for alternative trading systems. The ISD framework was in effect bottom-up. National law could mainly decide on the direction to take, whether through a regulatory and/or market-driven approach. CESR observed that during the ISD RMs charged prices for equity pre- and post-trade data based on: (1) a head count per-terminal for each end user, (2) use restrictions (e.g. redistribution) and (3) the type of data (e.g. depth and latency). Data vendors – in addition to RMs – applied their own fees. The ISD approach should be understood against the market setting of the ISD (highly concentrated), the aim for minimum harmonisation, and the fact that equity pre- and post-trade data prices touch upon other areas of law, such as intellectual property and competition law. The result was a mainly national approach for equity pre- and post-trade data prices under the ISD. As will be shown below, the concerns about equity pre- and post-trade data costs were relatively mild under the ISD. A main factor here was that trading was highly concentrated under the ISD. Hence, data from multiple venues was under the ISD less necessary compared to MiFID I/MiFID II.