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The Kansas City Board of Trade on Wednesday set a new all-time daily volume record for electronic trading in its Hard Red Winter Wheat futures contract.
Hard red winter wheat futures volume traded electronically tallied 40,588 contracts, breaking the previous daily record of 27,456 contracts set on September 25, 2009 by 47.8 percent. The increased trading volume could be attributed to several reasons.
Trading was very active in the Kansas City intra-market wheat spreads on Wednesday, according to KCBT traders. Ongoing weather concerns in Canada and China, coupled with a large tender by Saudi Arabia, also contributed to the increased volume.
Total HRW wheat futures volume for the day, which encompasses open outcry and electronic trading, was the second largest in the history of the exchange. Total volume equaled 47,466 contracts, shy only 467 contracts or less than 1 percent of the all-time record volume of 47,933 contracts.
Open interest in the HRW wheat futures contract set a new record of 186,276 contracts on June 11. This is the fifth time a new record has been set this June, after initially exceeding the July 12, 2006 record of 172,936 contracts on June 4.
Open interest measures the number of open trading positions in a market. Each KCBT wheat futures contract represents 5,000 bushels of wheat.
The KCBT, founded in 1856, is Kansas City’s oldest business and the world's largest futures market for hard red winter wheat. Daily quotes, market commentary, historical data and charting services are available on our website at www.kcbt.com.
