The Futures Industry Association, a Washington-based trade group, today released its annual report on global trading volume. The report, which measures volume based on the number of contracts traded on derivatives exchanges worldwide, indicates that more than 15 billion futures and options contracts changed hands during 2007, an increase of 28% from the previous year.
Copies of the report may be downloaded by going to the following web page: https://www.futuresindustry.org/volume_surge.asp
This year’s data shows that the industry-wide rate of growth is accelerating. Looking back at the last four years, worldwide volume rose 28% in 2007, 19% in 2006, 12% in 2005, and 9% in 2004. The last time that volume grew this rapidly was in 2003, when volume jumped 30% from 6.2 billion to 8.1 billion.
North America accounted for the largest share of the global volume total, with total volume reaching 6.14 billion contracts traded in 2007, up 33% on the previous year. The Asia-Pacific region came in second with 4.19 billion contracts traded in 2007, up 19% on the previous year.
In terms of categories, futures and options based on individual stocks was the fastest growing sector of the global market for exchange-traded derivatives, with volume up 42% to 4.09 billion contracts. Equity index futures and options was the largest sector, with volume up 26% to 5.62 billion contracts.
Mergers and acquisitions among derivatives exchanges had a significant impact on the FIA’s rankings of the world’s leading derivatives exchanges. The Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the Chicago Board of Trade, which merged into a single company during 2007, pulled ahead of the Korea Exchange as the world’s largest derivatives exchange, with combined volume of 2.8 billion contracts versus Korea’s 2.7 billion contracts. In addition, IntercontinentalExchange moved up to number 16 in the ranking following its consolidation of the New York Board of Trade and the Winnipeg Commodity Exchange.
The FIA’s report is based on statistical data provided voluntarily by 63 exchanges in more than 30 countries. In several cases, the FIA consolidates the data from affiliated exchanges and publishes one set of numbers for the group as a whole. As a result, there are only 54 exchanges listed in the volume rankings.
The FIA is the leading trade organization for the international futures industry. Its membership includes the world’s largest futures brokers as well as leading derivatives exchanges from more than 20 countries. A list of its members is available on the FIA web site.
