Fintech: A new M&A frontier

On September 26, the parent company of the Chicago Board Options Exchange announced the $3.2 billion acquisition of Bats Global Markets, a high-tech stock exchange founded 11 years ago. Of course, a multi-billion dollar merger transaction is little news to the New York legal market these days. Still, the CBOE-Bats deal is a timely reminder of the existence of a vibrant financial technology (“fintech”) sector largely based in New York.

The fintech industry has gone through several waves of M&A  activity over the last two decades. Internet-enabled consumer services, online banks, stock exchanges and trading platforms have all seen sector consolidation—and also fragmentation. These transactions have remade important components of the financial services  sector. To put the Bats transaction in context, a global wave of stock exchange consolidation at the end of the last decade was partly due to a new wave of competitors— including Bats—coming into the market since 2000.

Read the full article: Fintech A new MA frontier