European brokers have come to terms with last week's upheaval surrounding the introduction of new equity trading rules across 30 European countries to record their busiest day of trading yesterday.

Instinet, the Nomura-owned agency broker, hit a new daily high, trading shares valued at about €2.5bn ($3.8bn), while Liquidnet, the block trading specialist, topped $1bn in a single day for the first time in Europe.