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Intercontinental Exchange (NYSE: ICE) reported record trading volumes in the first half of 2025 for corporate and municipal bonds on its ICE Bonds electronic execution platforms.
Corporate bond trading reached a notional volume of $120 billion, an increase of 20% compared with the first half of 2024. Municipal bond trading recorded $109 billion in notional volume, up 35% on the same period a year earlier.
"We’re pleased to see the strong activity in the first half of the year, which marks the fourth consecutive year of volume increases in our corporate and municipal bond markets. This growth is in line with the progress we’ve made over the last few years expanding the functionality on our platforms and building out our institutional and wealth management network of customers."
— Peter Borstelmann, President of ICE Bonds
ICE Bonds also completed its first spread-based click-to-trade order. The approach combines spread-based pricing, commonly used by institutional investors, with the click-to-trade protocol more typical of retail and wealth management users. The feature allows participants to access quotes priced at a spread to Treasuries while using simplified execution tools.
The platform’s trading protocols include click-to-trade, sweeps, auctions and request for quote (RFQ), underpinned by fixed income data from ICE. A new RFQ protocol for Mortgage-Backed Securities (MBS) has also been introduced, sitting alongside ICE Bonds’ existing MBS click-to-trade marketplace.
ICE said its evaluated pricing and analytics support execution across pre-trade, trade and post-trade workflows. The service enables both anonymous and disclosed interactions across corporates, municipals, agencies, Treasuries and certificates of deposit, with transaction sizes ranging from odd-lots to blocks.
