09.03.2026 Consolidation Notice

In the first quarter (Q1) of 2026, volume trends in Leverage Shares’ products across 3 exchanges across Europe – the London Stock Exchange (LSE), the Borsa Italiana (BITA) and Germany’s XETRA – display highly varied regime narratives. The LSE in the United Kingdom indicates a regime of massive structural risk-on matched by historic levels of hedging. Baselines in leveraged crypto-proxies implied in MicroStrategy and Coinbase effectively doubled or tripled from January to March, completely rewriting the exchange’s liquidity profile. However, this massive risk-on exposure was paired with an equally historic structural surge in quarter-end hedging, led by the -5x Short Nasdaq 100 (QQ3S). Furthermore, flows in -3x Short South Korea (KORS) warped flows for the quarter entirely, evolving from a dormant asset in January into a massive macro liquidity vacuum.

Germany’s XETRA indicated a regime of grinding, structural defensive rotation – signalling deep institutional caution. While retail exuberance flashed briefly in February, the definitive structural trend of the quarter was a relentless scaling into deep market shorts. The -5x Short S&P 500 (5SPE) ballooned by over 600% against its January/February baseline, and the -5x Short Nasdaq 100 (QQ3S) compounded sequentially every single month.

Of the three exchanges, Italy’s BITA stands out as the healthiest tape among the three exchanges in Q1. A regime of uninterrupted thematic and commodity re-rating remained dominant with two distinct, massive structural expansions. First, legacy commodity flow awoke from dormancy: Brent Oil (BRENT) and WTI Oil (WTI) ETCs skyrocketed. Second, structural tech and crypto accumulation was unrelenting. Italian investors end Q1 with significantly expanded, confident thematic books that ignored the high-velocity whipsaws seen on other exchanges.

Momentum and Regimes

In the United Kingdom, the 3x Long AMD (AMD3) steadily compounded volume throughout the quarter to become the undisputed semiconductor proxy by the end of March.

Websim is the retail division of Intermonte, the primary intermediary of the Italian stock exchange for institutional investors. Leverage Shares often features in its speculative analysis based on macros/fundamentals. However, the information is published in Italian. To provide better information for our non-Italian investors, we bring to you a quick translation of the analysis they present to Italian retail investors. To ensure rapid delivery, text in the charts will not be translated. The views expressed here are of Websim. Leverage Shares in no way endorses these views. If you are unsure about the suitability of an investment, please seek financial advice. View the original at

Source: Leverage Shares analysis

However, KORS was Q1’s defining idiosyncratic event: a localized macro panic that warped the liquidity profile of the Leverage Shares catalogue in March. The quarter in the LSE finalized into a massive barbell strategy catalogue. Investors drastically expanded their long risk via crypto-proxies while simultaneously buying historic levels of portfolio insurance via QQ3S, wherein the massive nominal size of average daily volumes implied that institutional portfolios spent the quarter deeply insulated.

Germany, meanwhile, saw capital systematically rotating away from broad participation and into targeted downside protection.

Source: Leverage Shares analysis

SKOR was an acute event-driven trade that transformed into a permanent, highly elevated structural short position by quarter’s end. However, the positioning within the 5SPE is arguably the defining theme of Q1 for XETRA. Risk appetite for crypto-proxies – which witnessed a violent surge across February – completely stalled out on this exchange across March.

Italy, in comparison, was the most fundamentally bullish of the three exchanges in Q1.

Source: Leverage Shares analysis

Both WTI and BRENT were dormant tickers that completely revived into high-capacity institutional assets, representing the most dramatic permanent liquidity step-up in Q1. Meanwhile crypto-proxies maintained flawless, compounding thematic accumulation while refusing to mean-revert. The breadth of expansion across commodities, crypto-proxies, and semiconductors indicates that highly sophisticated, durable capital deployment is built to last into Q2.

New Product Trends

Looking back over the whole quarter, Q1 was an absolute monster for liquidity expansion in the LSE. Clients didn’t just buy the tech and crypto rally; they bought insurance in historic sizes. The final full week of March also had a host of new Leverage Shares products being introduced and the ranking table for the week within them showed deep thematic connections with trends seen across other products in the Leverage Shares catalogue.

Source: Leverage Shares analysis

The LSE’s existing volume is overwhelmingly dominated by high-beta, mega-cap tech and semiconductor momentum, with compounding flows in AMD3 across March, marking it as a core risk-on asset. The successful debut of ANDO perfectly taps into investors’ desire for “next-leg” alpha, wherein institutional capital is hunting for idiosyncratic, granular tech plays such as AI baskets and single-name chip infrastructure plays like SND3.

A defining theme of the broader European ETP landscape in Q1 was the massive, structural re-rating of commodity liquidity — particularly WTI and Brent Oil ETCs among investors in Leverage Shares’ products. Even the existing 1x and 2x iterations of WTI Oil and Gold on the LSE showed consistent base building. The signalling in the early trends shown in the GLD5, WTI3, and WTOS indicate strong latent demand for more aggressive leveraged alternatives in the commodities space.

Potential Trends: Early Q2

In terms of volumes for both the final week of March and for the entire month of March, LSE traded nearly five times the volume that Italy’s BITA did which, in turn were 2.5 times that of what XETRA did. Given that volume for the entirety of Q1 in LSE was 5.4X Borsa’s while Borsa’s volume was 2.1X that of XETRA, March was especially noteworthy wherein Italian investors actively identified opportunities and positioned their convictions. If Bitcoin consolidates, Milan is likely to expect a sharp, sudden volume rotation out of these names and into structurally expanding tech names – including but not limited to 3AMD, which built a resilient, lower-volatility base throughout Q1.

With structural tech hedging sitting at historic quarterly highs in London, institutional wealth is poised to hunt for the next leg of structural AI growth, as evidenced by the strong positioning in AMD3 and early trends in ANDO and SND3.

The near-10x growth in 5SPE from January to March leaves Germany top-heavy with structural short positioning heading into a new quarter. If global equities catch a positive start-of-quarter bid in April, a temporary liquidity push (at last) will likely be experienced toward leveraged U.S. tech and broad market proxies.

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