European banks are formalising plans for the structure of their internal trading venues known as broker dark pools, to help bring them in line with new EU guidelines, with project timeframes shorter than normal in a bid to get the platforms to market first.

Broker pools are trading venues that enable investors to trade large blocks of shares anonymously without adverse price movements, and banks are grappling with how to operate the venues under a revised version of the EU's markets in financial instruments directive.