After conducting two months of due diligence, the FSA granted NEL agreed to NEL's listing of a Brent miNYTM crude oil futures contract, which is scheduled to launch on February 6.
Samuel Gaer, chief executive officer of NYMEX Europe, said, "The NYMEX miNYs have seen great success in the U.S., so we are pleased to offer this additional risk management tool to the European energy trading community. Traders will benefit greatly from the stability of the NYMEX ClearPort® trading platform, combined with the financial security and capital efficiencies of the NYMEX clearinghouse. The more than 90 firms who have registered to trade on NYMEX ClearPort® will now have additional tools to create an international risk management portfolio."
The CFTC staff letter granted NYMEX Europe regulatory relief for NEL products that could be accessed electronically for trading from the United States by certain eligible users. In general, direct access to screen trading of NYMEX Europe products is now available to NEL members who trade for their own accounts through the applicable electronic trading system(s) (ETS) used by NEL for its products; NEL members who are registered with the CFTC as futures commission merchants (FCM) and who submit orders from or on behalf of U.S. customers to the ETS; NEL members who are registered with the CFTC as FCMs and that accept orders transmitted to them through an automated order routing system for transmission to the ETS; and NEL members who are registered with the CFTC as commodity pool operators or as commodity trading advisors and who wish to submit orders on behalf of U.S. pools they operate or U.S. customer accounts for which they have discretionary authority, provided that a NYMEX clearing member that is registered with the CFTC as a FCM acts as a clearing firm for such CPOs or CTAs with respect to all such activity. A copy of the staff no–action letter is linked here: http://www.nymex.com/media/noaction.pdf
NYMEX Europe Chairman Roy Leighton said, "In the ever–evolving world of commodity futures, NYMEX Europe is adapting to the changing marketplace. We are striving to make our products as accessible and useful as possible to the energy industry."
