CBOE Seat Price Hits New High - Sale Of $850,000 On Monday, December 19 Is The Sixth Record Price This Month

The Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE) announced that yesterday a seat, or membership, at CBOE was sold for a new all-time record price. The CBOE seat sale of $850,000 on Monday, December 19th surpassed the previous CBOE all-time record seat price of $800,000 set on Thursday, December 8, 2005, and became the sixth record seat price set during the month of December.

Yesterday's record sale of $850,000 is an increase of 184% over the seat sale of $299,000 from January 6th, which was the first seat transaction of 2005. Through the end of the day Monday, 103 seats have been bought and sold at CBOE this year. By comparison, a total of 66 seats sold at CBOE for the entire year of 2004.

Seats are bought and sold via CBOE's membership department using an auction method in which bids and offers are submitted to the Exchange on an as-desired basis, and should a certain bid match a certain offer, a sale is made and the respective parties are notified.

CBOE, the world's largest options marketplace and the creator of listed options, is regulated by the SEC. For additional information about the CBOE and its products, access the CBOE website at: http://www.cboe.com/