U.S. Fixed Income Market: Industry Trends & Drivers 2017

In the decade since a myriad of complex and entangled market factors drove the global financial markets into crisis, major regulatory initiatives have been signed into law, implemented, and enforced. These sweeping changes have been a driving force behind a significant change in the final form of the US fixed income markets. Workflows have been altered, new technology developed, and entirely new streams of transparent market data made available to participants. On the other hand, continued regulatory reform in the US and Europe, changing central bank monetary policies, consolidation of assets under management, the accelerated proliferation of electronic trading, reduction in dealer balance sheet capacity, and declining bid/ask spreads coupled with increased liquidity premiums are perennial issues for the US fixed income market.

In this TABB Group report, U.S. Fixed Income Market: Industry Trends & Drivers 2017, the fourth in a series of annual reports tracking a growing list of critical factors impacting the OTC fixed income markets in a post-financial crisis world, TABB Group continues to looks at the past, and the trends that have been developing throughout the fixed income ecosystem, illustrating the changes underway in terms of the structural components of the market and dive into some of the idiosyncrasies present in the rates, credit, and swaps markets to gain a better understanding of what might await market participants looking to the future.