THE London Stock Exchange has set out a detailed timetable for a controversial reform of its share trading systems that will create the biggest upheaval since the Big Bang deregulation 10 years ago.
The announcement followed a week of turmoil for the exchange after it ousted chief executive Mr Michael Lawrence amid widespread dissent at his handling of the move to automated share trading.
Yet exchange chairman Mr John Kemp-Welch insisted Mr Lawrence's departure had not dented its determination to press ahead with reforms. They were essential if London, Europe's busiest stock market, was to fend off competition from other European bourses.
Laying out a seven-month timetable for introducing the reforms, the exchange's director of markets development, Mr Giles Vardey, said five weeks of consultation would be followed by a meeting of its 20-member board on March 21st which would decide how to proceed.
The new trading platform, Sequence VI, should be ready for action on August 27th, though that date depends in part on hard-pressed computer experts at broking firms having time to do the necessary implementation work.
Mr Vardey said the reforms were different in nature from the Big Bang in 1986, when sweeping changes led to a wave of mergers between London's long-established broking and jobbing firms. But they were "clearly significant changes".
Mr Vardey set out three options for the exchange's planned move towards a so-called "order-matching" system.
Under the system, new to London, orders to buy or sell could be matched by computer rather than being carried out by market-makers at large stock broking firms.
The three options differ in detail but all would allow shares to be traded automatically without involving the market-makers.
The announcement comes at a sensitive time for the London stock market.
A parliamentary committee has already started an inquiry into the exchange's future role and competitiveness in the wake of Mr Lawrence's ousting.
Other European markets already offer some form of automatic order-matching facility.
The London market also faces a challenge from the start-up last September of rival electronic exchange Tradepoint, which is already offering an order-matching alternative.
Mr Vardey, tipped by some players as the leading internal candidate to take over as chief executive, declined to comment on whether he was being considered for the post.