Canada’s TMX Group, which operates the Toronto Stock Exchange, the TSX Venture Exchange and the Montreal Exchange, has announced three large acquisitions this year after making a series of smaller acquisitions in 2025.

John McKenzie, chief executive of TMX Group, told Markets Media that he expects the group to look very different in size and scope in one year’s time.

“We will be very much the same in terms of the culture and the innovation that we look to support,” he added. “We will be a bigger, better version of who we already are.”

Cboe Australia and Cboe Canada

In April this year TMX announced plans to acquire Cboe Australia and Cboe Canada from Cboe Global Markets for $300m. On 2 August 2026 TMX said it had completed the acquisition of Cboe Australia, which is being rebranded as TMX Australia Exchange.

McKenzie said TMX first considered buying Chi-X Asia Pacific’s Australian business when it was acquired by Cboe Global Markets back in June 2021.

“We were not ready then with our global strategy and we did not have some of the capabilities around supporting the ETF market,” he added. “We have a lot more that we can export today, including new clearing and trading capabilities. ”

When Craig Donohue, chief executive of Cboe Global Markets, reached out to TMX about buying Cboe Canada, McKenzie said the group was only interested in a deal that also included Australia. Donohue had become chief executive of Cboe in May 2025 and reset the strategy, including selling non-core businesses.

The Australian exchange was recently granted a license for corporate listings, and also lists ETFs, structured products and warrants. McKenzie said the listings capability is interesting because Canada is one of the best markets in the world for ETFs, which are less developed in Australia, and also one of the best markets for small-cap issuers, which is also not well developed in Australia.

McKenzie argued that Canada and Australia are two of the best markets for natural resources and approximately 27 companies from Australia are already listed in Canada. He added: “We see a long-term ability to support global companies raising capital in multiple markets.”

In 2021 TMX moved to trading derivatives 23 hours a day so that the exchange was open to Australian super funds that wanted to manage their Canadian dollar exposure, according to McKenzie. He said that during the last quarter almost 10% of trading volume for TMX’s flagship derivatives contracts came from Europe and Asia during the extended hour sessions. There may also be opportunities to expand Trayport, TMX’s energy trading platform, into Australia.

“I don’t know if it’s the perfect time for the acquisition, but it’s the best time yet,” he added.

The most important priority for the integration is to migrate the Australian exchange onto TMX’s technology.

“We are transitioning to our next generation platform, which we launched about a year and a half ago in the U.S. on our ATS (alternative trading system),” said McKenzie.

In January 2025 TMX launched AlphaX US , its first market expansion outside Canada. McKenzie said the new technology will launch in Australia next, and then in Canada, following the close of the Cboe Canada transaction.

Cboe acquired MATCHNow ATS, Canada’s largest equities dark pool by trading volume, in August 2020 and NEO, a fintech including a fully registered Tier-1 Canadian securities exchange, in June 2022. They were then formally integrated into one corporate entity. McKenzie said the regulatory review of the acquisition is moving as expected.

“Once Australia is integrated, we can move resource to drive the transition in Canada,” he added. “Sometimes long lead times are great because you can prep in advance.”

He expects the integration of both Australia and Cboe Canada to take between 12 and 18 months.

U.S

On July 2026 TMX announced an agreement to invest in MEMX, a U.S. equities and options exchange operator and market technology provider. Concurrent with that transaction, BOX, a U.S. equity options market with both electronic and floor-based trading, will be combined with MEMX. TMX Group will have an approximately 59% ownership interest in the combined business which will have an enterprise value of $2.3bn.

Jonathan Kellner, chief executive of MEMX, said in a statement: “Bringing BOX’s unique electronic and open outcry trading functionality to MEMX’s price time and pro-rata exchanges provides enhanced customer functionality and the ability to compete across all of the US options exchange models.”

The new entity will be funded by an equity investment from TMX Group of approximately $800m, a rollover of TMX’s existing equity interest in BOX, committed rollovers from a group of MEMX and BOX investors  and an investment from a new financial partner. The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2027, subject to regulatory approval.

McKenzie said the long term vision issue for TMX to be a full service player across the value chain in the U.S. Many Canadian firms also list in the U.S. and trade across the border so the new business eventually could create a cross-border product if there is demand and support capital raising.

“Our ATS was a really good opportunity  to build and test our hypothesis that we could bring capabilities into the U.S. and target different segments,” he added.

For example, AlphaX targets execution quality in institutional trading while MEMX is more about continuous market trading, Although the U.S. market is highly competitive, McKenzie argued that the deal is combining platforms in partnership with some of the largest trading houses in the U.S. and that the new venue can differentiate itself through its partners, products and functionality.

“The U.S. is the fastest growing market in the world and has a constant drive for innovation, so we want to participate,” he added.

Index business

The Canadian group has as close relationship with S&P Dow Jones Indices and their index series benchmarks value and performance for multiple segments of Canada’s stock market.

However,TMX to wanted to innovate in certain areas, such as thematics, to support the fast-growing ETF industry. TMX VettaFi expanded in 2025 through three acquisitions – Credit Suisse Bond Indices in February, ETF Stream in June, and a set of nuclear energy sector indices in October.

McKenzie said: “TMX VettaFi is not just an index factory but we also have a distribution capability with roughly 200,000 investment advisors in our network.”

He said that these acquisitions have doubled in size. Assets tracking TMX indices have increased approximately $30bn to close to $300bn, according to McKenzie. He continued that annual index revenues have grown from $70m a year to over $200m.

On 12 June 2026 TMX said it was acquiring RAFI Indices, a global index company from Research Affiliates, for $490m. VettaFi has historically focused on thematic indices, while RAFI  focuses more on fundamental research and fundamental equity portfolios.

Focus on core

Although TMX has made a series of acquisitions, McKenzie stressed that the group invests more in its home market than abroad.

“There is no M&A strategy, there is just strategy” he added. “Each of these pieces helps accelerate our strategy.”

For example, in April 2025 TMX completed the technology upgrade of its subsidiary, The Canadian Depository for Securities Limited, which included the replacing certain legacy clearing and settlement systems, as well as depository and entitlement payments. McKenzie said that Australia is on the same journey.

The Canadian leg of the Cboe transaction is about making it more cost-effective, efficient, and faster for investors to connect and trade in the country.

“The focus on core is always top of mind, which is why we were excited about Cboe being a dual market transaction,” he added. “We can invest in capabilities for our home clients at the same time.”

In a similar fashion, he argued that the MEMX transaction is exciting because it allows the group to support cross-border clients in a new way. Adding new index capabilities allows the group to offer new ETFs , which McKenzie described as part of TMX’s core franchise.

“I don’t think exchanges should ever lose focus on their core markets because that is the most important thing we do every day,” he added.