April 2005 Second Busiest Month In NYBOT’s 135-Year History

Combined monthly trading volume during April 2005 ranked the second highest in history at the New York Board of Trade® (NYBOT®), with 3,422,309 contracts being traded (June 2004 volume was first with 3,611,479 futures and options contracts). Trading volume at the world’s leading “soft” commodities exchange continued to post strong gains, with the April 2005 volume up 17% year-to-date (YTD) and 12,969,775 combined futures and options contracts changing hands. The total futures and options volume for April 2005 was also 19% more than April 2004.

Cotton futures set a monthly volume record in April 2005 of 465,210 contracts. The Russell 1000 Index options contract set a monthly volume record with 22,134 contracts.

NYBOT’s new Pulp (symbol P) futures and options contracts saw continued strength in both volumes and open interest during the month. The Pulp contract trades from 7:55 am to 9:00 am (NY Time).

Some individual product highlights through April 2005 (all YTD) include:

NYBOT’s Sugar No. 11SM (symbol SB) futures contract volume jumped 21%, and the options (symbol SO) gained 10%.
The Cotton No. 2SM (symbol CT) futures contract climbed 18%, the Frozen Concentrated Orange Juice options contract (or FCOJ, symbol OJ) rose 59%, and NYBOT’s Coffee “C”® options contract (symbol KC) rose 6%.
The Cocoa futures (symbol CC) contract rose 16%, and cocoa options (symbol CO) were up 82%.
In NYBOT’s financial markets, volume in the U.S. Dollar Index® (symbol DX®) futures contract rose 18%, and the Russell 1000® Index (symbol R) options contract was up 85%.

The New York Board of Trade (NYBOT) is New York’s original futures exchange, where the world trades food, fiber and financial products. For well over a century, the New York Board of Trade has provided reliability, integrity and security in a global marketplace for cocoa, coffee, cotton, ethanol, orange juice, pulp and sugar, as well as currency and index futures and options. Information about the New York Board of Trade can be found at www.nybot.com and www.nybotlive.com.