Continuing recent open interest trends, interest rate products set a new record yesterday of 12,724,563 positions, surpassing the previous record of 12,706,976 positions on August 21. Interest rate options reached a new high of 7,827,547 positions, as did Eurodollar options, at 7,826,102 positions. Previous records had been set one day earlier, August 21, at 7,809,533 for interest rate options and 7,808,107 for Eurodollar options.
In addition, open interest in E-mini S&P 500 futures set new open interest recrods for two consecutive days, with yesterday's 138,347 positions surpassing the previous day's record of 136,800 positions.
Open interest is the number of futures and options contracts outstanding at the close of trading each day. As of June 30, Eurodollar futures, introduced in 1981, represented the world's most actively traded futures contract. CME also has the largest futures and options on futures open interest of any exchange in the world, with 12.2 million contracts open as of June 30, 2001. Eurodollar options were launched in 1985. Also traded in the interest rate complex are contracts based on One-Month LIBOR, Euroyen and Treasury bills.
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.
