The Options Industry Council (OIC) announced today that total options trading volume in February was 256,464,343 contracts, a 4.93 percent increase over the 244,419,633 contracts traded for the same period last year.
Average daily trading volume in February was 13,498,123 contracts compared to 12,220,981 contracts for the same year-ago period, which is a 10.45 percent increase. In an unusual occurrence, average daily volume in February was higher than it was in January—13.5 million contracts compared to 12.9 million—something that has not happened in at least eight years.
Average daily trading volume for 2009 is 13,186,611 contracts, compared to 14,672,755 contracts for the same period last year and representing a 10.13 percent decline. Year-to-date options volume stands at 514,277,856 contracts, down 14.51 percent compared with the 601,582,921 contracts traded for the same period in 2008.
Equity options volume came in at 238,866,795 contracts, up 6.25 percent from the 224,808,922 contracts changing hands in the same year-ago period. February equity options averaged 12,571,937 contracts per day compared to the 11,240,446 contracts that were averaged per day during the same period last year.
