Only a handful of stocks in the FTSE 250, which includes the UK’s largest companies, would not breach dark pool caps being introduced under European securities law coming into effect from 2017, according to research by the London Stock Exchange.

The LSE found that 99 stocks in the FTSE 100 index of UK blue chips would have breached dark pool caps being introduced under the revised Markets in Financial Instruments Directive, had they been in place in 2014.