Nasdaq and OMX to create trans-Atlantic exchange

By Dominic Jones

NASDAQ Stock Market Inc. is bidding $3.67 billion for Sweden’s OMX AB, Europe’s sixth-largest stock exchange group, in a deal to create the second trans-Atlantic stock exchange.

OMX AB sells exchange software and operates equity and derivatives exchanges in the Nordic and Baltic markets. Its Nordic Exchange includes exchanges in Copenhagen, Stockholm, Helsinki, Iceland, Riga, Tallinn and Vilnius.

Nasdaq’s move, which has support of the companies’ boards, comes after the U.S. stock exchange failed in its bid to win the London Stock Exchange three months ago and after the tie-up of the New York Stock Exchange and Euronext.

The new company will be known as Nasdaq OMX Group. It will have approximately 4,000 companies listed from 39 countries with a combined market cap of about $5.5 trillion. The combined company will be the world’s biggest for listings in the technology, software, telecommunications, and — wait for it — pulp and paper industries.

Each of the combined group’s markets will continue to be regulated according to local requirements. OMX’s markets will continue to be regulated by their existing regulators, and the SEC will continue to regulate Nasdaq’s US markets only. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act will continue to apply only to companies registered in the US.

Of course, you know what else this means, don’t you? Nasdaq subsidiaries Shareholder.com and Prime Newswire are coming to Nordic companies! Yikes, never mind that Nordic companies are better off without them and that some of Shareholder.com’s products are illegal in parts of Europe.

While I go off to have a good cry, help yourself to these additional resources:

• Bloomberg
• Reuters via the Washington Post
• AP via BusinessWeek
• OMX announcement hub
• Nasdaq news release

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