CME Group wipes bacon off the floor, plans headquarters
CME Group has taken the decision to close several trading pits in the floor trading integration with Chicago Board of Trade (CBoT) and move them onto the CME Globex trading platform. The move has been greeted surprisingly well by some members who agree that they could perform better with exclusive screen presence.
With some contracts trading more than 90% of the volume on Globex the exchange announced it will close pits for pork bellies contracts, cash dairy, South American soybeans, ethanol, Euroyen and 100Oz gold and 5,000Oz silver options.
Pork bellies traded in the hundreds of contracts over the past year or so and is the smallest volume contract among the livestock complex at CME Group. Other contracts being pushed onto the screen have done little or no volume including South American soybeans and ethanol.
You can hope that these contracts will get a little more mainstream by putting them on Globex, said Randy Mittelstaedt, a grains analyst with RJ Obrien.
Several small FX futures contracts will also move exclusively onto the screen including the Brazilian real, Czech koruna, Hungarian forint, South Korean won, Polish zloty, Russian ruble and South African rand as well cross-rate futures. Trading of the remaining forex products will be consolidated into just one trading pit and will continue to trade side-by-side.
CME, which plans to start construction on the trading floor at CBoT this week, said it will move its equity index products to the new trading floor in March, followed by interest rate and forex contracts in April and commodities in May.
Meanwhile, CME has confirmed plans to sell its trading floor space to Tishman Speyer Properties which will convert it into offices. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but the plan will keep the CME's headquarters in the same building on Wacker Drive and lease about 360,000 square feet, or roughly about 33% less than they use now. The Wacker space and another 220,000 square feet of office space several blocks away at 550 W. Washington will largely focus on electronic trading and clearing operations.
Floor staff will be located at the CBoT building where they will integrate and maintain floor operations. All told CME Group will employ almost of its 2,000 person staff at the three locations, after its downsizing which will eliminate 380 jobs.
With some contracts trading more than 90% of the volume on Globex the exchange announced it will close pits for pork bellies contracts, cash dairy, South American soybeans, ethanol, Euroyen and 100Oz gold and 5,000Oz silver options.
Pork bellies traded in the hundreds of contracts over the past year or so and is the smallest volume contract among the livestock complex at CME Group. Other contracts being pushed onto the screen have done little or no volume including South American soybeans and ethanol.
You can hope that these contracts will get a little more mainstream by putting them on Globex, said Randy Mittelstaedt, a grains analyst with RJ Obrien.
Several small FX futures contracts will also move exclusively onto the screen including the Brazilian real, Czech koruna, Hungarian forint, South Korean won, Polish zloty, Russian ruble and South African rand as well cross-rate futures. Trading of the remaining forex products will be consolidated into just one trading pit and will continue to trade side-by-side.
CME, which plans to start construction on the trading floor at CBoT this week, said it will move its equity index products to the new trading floor in March, followed by interest rate and forex contracts in April and commodities in May.
Meanwhile, CME has confirmed plans to sell its trading floor space to Tishman Speyer Properties which will convert it into offices. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but the plan will keep the CME's headquarters in the same building on Wacker Drive and lease about 360,000 square feet, or roughly about 33% less than they use now. The Wacker space and another 220,000 square feet of office space several blocks away at 550 W. Washington will largely focus on electronic trading and clearing operations.
Floor staff will be located at the CBoT building where they will integrate and maintain floor operations. All told CME Group will employ almost of its 2,000 person staff at the three locations, after its downsizing which will eliminate 380 jobs.
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