MarketAxess Hits $1T in Credit Trades in 2Q25, But FPM Slips

MarketAxess Holdings Inc. MKTX recently announced that its electronic trading platform facilitated more than $1 trillion in total credit trading volume in the second quarter of 2025, a historic first for the company. The metric jumped 20% year over year. Additionally, their rates trading business also posted a new high, reaching $2 trillion in total volume for the quarter, a 55% jump from a year ago.

In the second quarter, MarketAxess’ High-yield and Eurobonds credit businesses witnessed 25% year-over-year growth, each. Emerging markets saw a 20% increase in average daily volume ("ADV") from the year-ago period. Meanwhile, in rates trading, agency and other government bonds witnessed an 81% surge in total volume, whereas U.S. government bonds grew by 54%.

However, total credit average transaction fees per million (“FPM”) declined 7% year over year in the second quarter due to protocol mix, while the same for total rates fell 12% due to changes in product mix.

The number of trading days in the United States was 62 in the second quarter, while the same in the U.K. was 60. The total trading ADV was recorded at $49 billion, up 43% year over year. These figures underscore strong demand for MarketAxess’s electronic trading services across fixed-income markets. Its estimated market share of U.S. credit portfolio trading came at 17.5%, rising from 15.1% a year ago.

It continues to diversify beyond core fixed-income trading through moves such as acquiring a majority stake in RFQ-hub Holdings LLC. It recently launched the first fully electronic trading workflow for Indian Government Bonds accessible to Foreign Portfolio Investors.

How MKTX’s Peers Are Expanding?

CME Group CME recently announced that it is gearing up to launch CME FX Tape+ later this year. With the new service, CME Group aims to provide an accessible and unbiased view of the FX market by leveraging data from over 1,400 institutions and 100,000 active participants. The move can also support CME Group’s cross-product monetization efforts.

Bigger peer Intercontinental Exchange, Inc. ICE bought the American Financial Exchange from 7RIDGE earlier this year. The deal was expected to complement Intercontinental Exchange’s global index business and the mortgage technology network. Growing volumes in energy and financial markets and increasing volatility will likely boost Intercontinental Exchange’s transactional business.

MarketAxess’ Price Performance, Valuation and Estimates

Shares of MarketAxess have declined 1.8% year to date against the industry’s growth of 21.1%.

From a valuation standpoint, MarketAxess trades at a forward price-to-earnings ratio of 27.86X, higher than the industry average. MKTX carries a Value Score of D.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for MarketAxess’ second quarter 2025 earnings implies an 11.1% rise year over year. The consensus mark for full-year earnings predicts a 2.9% increase from a year ago.

The stock currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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