The records come on the heels of CME's busiest single month in history, with trading volume of 34.4 million contracts in August and year-to-date volume to 255.1 million -already making 2001 a record volume year for CME.
Also yesterday, volume on CME's GLOBEX®2 electronic trading system rose to a new single-day record of 425,179 contracts, surpassing the previous single-day record of 423,804 set March 31. Equity and index futures and options on futures traded on GLOBEX2 posted a record of 366,781, surpassing CME's previous record of 361,544 contracts set on March 22. Foreign exchange futures and options on futures traded on GLOBEX2 reached a new high of 26,740, surpassing the previous record set on Aug. 15 with 25,314 contracts traded.
Volume and open interest in interest rate futures and options on futures also posted single-day records yesterday, with 2,175,250 contracts changing hands and 13,163,364 open positions. The previous records for these products were set on April 18 with 2,140,435 contracts traded and on Aug. 31 with 13,161,960 open positions. Open interest is the number of futures and options contracts outstanding at the close of trading each day.
Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. (www.cme.com) is an international marketplace that brings together buyers and sellers on its trading floors and GLOBEX®2 around-the-clock electronic trading system. CME offers futures contracts and options on futures primarily in four product areas: interest rates, stock indexes, foreign exchange and commodities. On Nov. 13, 2000, CME finalized its transformation into a for-profit, shareholder-owned corporation as it became the first U.S. financial exchange to demutualize by converting its membership interests into shares of common stock that can trade separately from exchange trading privileges. The exchange moves about $1.5 billion per day in settlement payments and manages $28.4 billion in collateral deposits.
