Q3 2026 Securities Lending Market Review: Asia Continues to Lead North America as Equity Lending Leader

The global securities finance industry delivered another record quarter, with APAC equities leading North America for the first full quarter on record. Equilend Data & Insights tracked $5.64 billion in Q3 2026 revenue, a 22% increase year-on-year, as a resurgent AI and memory-chip supply cycle in Taiwan met a re-escalation of the Iran war, which pushed oil prices higher and set the stage for a surprise Federal Reserve rate hike in September, reversing months of expected cuts.

The drive-in earnings in the Asia-Pacific market continues to mark a structural break from recent years, when North America anchored global revenue through concentrated, high-fee specials activity. This quarter’s growth was broader-based by comparison, built on sustained activity across both equities and fixed income rather than a handful of hard-to-borrow names. Average on-loan value climbed to $3.95 trillion, up 28% year-on-year, underlining the sheer scale of activity even as its geography changed.

The growth spanned the ecosystem:

• Lender-to-broker activity generated $4.32 billion (+23% YoY), while broker-to-broker added $1.32 billion (+19%).
• Equities led the charge at $3.44 billion (+22%), while fixed income delivered $879 million (+28%).
• Across Equilend’s NGT platform, Q3 processed a record 12.48 million trades, up 21.1% year-on-year, with every region posting growth.

North American equities: Last year’s specials give way to a quieter market

North American equities generated $1.31 billion in Q3 2026, a 23% decrease year-on-year, as the region ceded its position as the largest equity lending region globally for the first time. The decline was driven by the fading of last year’s extreme specials activity, with U.S. average fees collapsing 46% to 41 bps as hyper-concentrated demand around last year’s names like CoreWeave and Paramount Global unwound without being replaced at the same intensity. Canada held relatively steady at $87 million (-4%).

At the security level, SpaceX (SPCX) led the region in its first full quarter in the lending market following June’s landmark IPO, generating $50.6 million. Other top performers included:

• Lucid Group (LCID): Contributed $30.2 million amid continued EV-sector short interest.
• Sellas Life Sciences (SLS): Generated $29.7 million on elevated biotech-sector positioning.
• Infosys ADR (INFY): Added $29.0 million as reshoring-related short interest persisted.
• Ondas (ONDS) and SoundHound AI (SOUN): Featured among the region’s other top earners at $21.9 million and $17.1 million respectively, both driven by high utilization as demand to borrow outpaced available lendable supply.

The names driving trading volume told a slightly different story: NGT platform data shows Kimberly-Clark, Charter Communications, Dick’s Sporting Goods, SoFi and Super Micro among the most actively traded in September, also serving as a reminder that the busiest names on the platform aren’t always the same as the biggest fee earners.

EMEA equities: Broad-based growth continues

EMEA equities delivered $397 million in lending revenue, up 56% year-on-year, driven by broad gains across the region’s core markets rather than a handful of concentrated specials:

• The U.K. led the region at $75 million (+54%), a trend also reflected in NGT trading data, which showed U.K. equity trade counts up 18.1% year-on-year, supported by continued positioning in energy and metals names like Metlen Energy & Metals as oil prices stayed elevated through the quarter.
• Germany followed at $59 million (+106%), with Porsche AG among the largest contributors as investors continued to position around structural uncertainty facing European automakers navigating the EV transition and rising Chinese competition.
• France added $51 million (+74%), helped by steady demand in names like Vusion.
• Turkey was the standout mover, up 157% year-on-year to $18 million, reflecting the thin local lendable supply that has long made the market disproportionately fee-rich relative to its size.

At a security-level, Sivers Semiconductors (SIVE) featured prominently, generating $7.2 million as investors extended the quarter’s AI and chip-supply-chain theme into Europe’s smaller-cap semiconductor names.

APAC equities: A historic changing of the guard

APAC equities generated $1.70 billion in Q3 2026, up a staggering 99% year-on-year, extending its lead over North America as the largest equity lending region, a position it has held on a monthly basis since April and now holds for the full quarter for the first time on record. The growth was powered by Taiwan’s AI and memory-chip supply boom and a wave of Hong Kong-listed consumer and AI names. The region has now delivered $3.82 billion in equity lending revenue year-to-date, up 84% year-on-year, accounting for 43% of all global equity lending revenue generated so far in 2026.

By market:

• Taiwan: Generated $532 million (+212%), as the island’s AI server supply chain ran at full capacity to meet demand for Nvidia’s GB300 platform. Quanta Computer and Wiwynn Corporation, two of its largest AI server assemblers, each saw revenue surge nearly 50-fold year-on-year to around $33 million, as average fees jumped to over 700bps on both names.
• Hong Kong: Added $582 million (+119%), led by Pop Mart International Group, the single largest revenue-generating security globally at $161.8 million, alongside newly-listed AI name Z.ai ($87.6 million).
• Japan and South Korea: Contributed $263 million (+20%) and $233 million (+68%) respectively, rounding out the region’s gains.

That shift shows up clearly in trading volumes too: NGT trade counts rose 27.5% in Hong Kong, 18.2% in Taiwan, 17.9% in Korea, and 21.3% in Australia. Japan bucked the trend, with NGT trade counts down 3.9% even as revenue rose 20%, suggesting growth there was increasingly concentrated in higher-value, higher-fee activity rather than broader volume.

Global ETFs: Leveraged AI and semiconductor products take centre stage

ETF lending revenue reached $247 million in Q3 2026, rising 102% year-on-year, as investors increasingly reached for leveraged products to amplify exposure to the quarter’s dominant AI and semiconductor trade, a shift also visible in trading volumes, where NGT data shows ETF trades were the fastest-growing equity-related product type on the platform, up 56.8% year-on-year. North America remained the largest contributor at $180 million (+80%), while APAC was the fastest-growing region by far, surging more than eightfold year-on-year to $38 million as Hong Kong-listed leveraged products took off alongside the region’s broader chip-sector boom.

At the security level, standouts included:

• CSOP SK Hynix 2x Leveraged ETF: The top-earning ETF globally at $19.9 million, tracking the memory maker at the heart of Nvidia’s AI supply chain.
• Direxion Daily Semiconductor Bull 3x ETF: Added $16.1 million as U.S. investors sought leveraged exposure to the same chip theme.
• iShares MSCI China A UCITS ETF: Contributed $13.0 million, reflecting continued investor positioning around Chinese equity exposure.
• CSOP Samsung Electronics 2x Leveraged ETF: Rounded out the top performers, underlining how concentrated the quarter’s ETF activity was around the memory and chip-supply narrative.

North American fixed income: Rate shock reignites fixed income demand

North American fixed income generated $581 million in Q3 2026, a 34% increase year-on-year, as the Fed’s September rate hike and a resulting spike in Treasury yields brought renewed focus to the asset class, a shift also visible in trading volumes, where NGT data shows U.S. sovereign debt trade counts up 22.8% year-on-year.

Government bonds led the way, climbing 40% year-on-year to $434 million, as the 10-year Treasury yield’s move to a 16-year high drove a wave of repositioning and hedging activity around rate-sensitive exposures. Corporate bonds also saw steady growth, generating $147 million, up 20% year-on-year, as market participants sought to capitalize on widening spreads, consistent with NGT trading data showing corporate bond trade counts up 15.8% over the same period.

EMEA fixed income: Steady gains across core markets

EMEA fixed income revenue reached $246 million, up 19% year-on-year, supported by continued activity in sovereign debt markets. NGT trading data points to even stronger momentum building beneath the revenue figure, with EMEA fixed income trade counts up 26.3% year-on-year, the fastest growth of any region on the platform.

France led the region with $70 million in revenue (+20%), followed by the U.K. at $55 million (+22%) and Germany at $37 million (+12%). Italy was the fastest mover, up 64% year-on-year to $17 million, continuing a trend of elevated peripheral European activity.

Looking ahead: A shifting landscape heads into Q4

Heading into the final quarter of 2026, three open questions will shape how the year closes out: will the Iran conflict keep energy prices high? How will the Fed’s rate path unfold after September’s hike reversed expectations of further cuts? Will APAC’s new position atop the equity lending table hold or will North America’s fee-rich specials activity return?

However, Q4 answers those questions, the market enters it from a position of strength. Global securities lending revenue has reached $14.75 billion through the first three quarters of 2026, up 29% year-on-year. That total is already within striking distance of the $15.33 billion generated across all of 2025, itself a record year, a pace of growth corroborated by NGT’s own trading data, which processed a record 12.48 million trades in Q3. Barring a sharp reversal, 2026 looks set to surpass 2025 as the industry’s biggest year yet.