Euronext CEO open to big-bang deal with Deutsche Börse, but don’t hold your breath

Euronext CEO Stéphane Boujnah has a very specific talent: making a deal sound inevitable and impossible in the same breath. His latest comments on a potential combination with Deutsche Börse follow that tradition almost perfectly. Speaking in May 2026, Boujnah acknowledged that a merger between Europe’s two largest exchange operators would be logically compelling, then noted that Euronext had already tried to make it happen three times without success. The implication being that the fourth attempt is not exactly on the calendar. The logic is clear, the obstacles are clearer On paper, a Euronext-Deutsche Börse combination would create something close to a pan-European exchange behemoth. Euronext already operates bourses in Amsterdam, Brussels, Dublin, Lisbon, Milan, Oslo, Paris, and Athens, covering a combined market capitalization of roughly €6.8 trillion. That figure is nearly triple Deutsche Börse’s own market footprint, which tells you something about the relative negotiating positions involved. Boujnah has been building toward this scale methodically since taking the CEO role in 2015. The group bought Borsa Italiana from the London Stock Exchange Group in 2021, adding Milan to ...