The top five US derivatives banks continued to grow their market share of US futures and options in July with Morgan Stanley narrowly beating Goldman Sachs and Bank of America with the largest increase.

JP Morgan, Goldman, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America and SG Americas reported in July a combined $157.8bn (£120bn) of assets in segregated accounts, an increase of 8.1% on the June totals, according to data from the US futures regulator.

The CFTC’s latest Financial Data for Futures Commission Merchants (FCMs) report showed the top five banks’ 8.1% compared favourably to the overall market growth of 6.8%, which took the total US market to $294.5bn at the end of July.

The top five banks’ total assets of $157.8bn represented a combined market share of 53.6% which was up from 52.9% the previous month, according to the CFTC.

All five banks increased their assets in July with JP Morgan up 4.3% to $42.06bn and Goldman Sachs reporting assets 9.5% higher to $37.25bn while Morgan Stanley was the pick of the bunch with assets up 11.6% to $29.72bn in July.

BOFA Securities reported assets up 9.2% month-on-month to $28.45bn and SG Americas Securities saw assets rise 7.3% to $20.33bn.

Outside of the top five, the performance was more mix. Citigroup Global Markets reported assets rising 3.2% to $17.28bn and Barclays was up 3.7% to $17.01bn.

Interactive Brokers reported assets up 9.3% to $8.85bn, propelling the only non-bank FCM in the top ten above Mizuho into eighth spot. The US arm of the Japanese bank reported assets down 14.4% to $8.81bn while BNP Paribas Securities consolidated its tenth place with assets up 9.5% to $8.03bn.

Across the 64 FCMs listed by the CFTC, ten firms reported their segregated assets down last month, the largest of which by value of assets were Mizuho and Marex Capital Markets, which saw its assets fall a marginal 0.2% to just over $7bn.

The CFTC report also lists nine firms with zero customer assets in segregated accounts including Jefferies LLC, Mint Brokers and Scotia Capital USA Inc. Lime Trading Corporation reported assets unchanged to the end of July, at $46,094.

Of the 44 firms that reported an increase in customer assets in segregated accounts, 17 returned increases of more than 10%.

Robinhood Markets, which bought in March this year the FCM license that Marex inherited when it acquired ED&F Man Capital Markets in late 2022, was the most performant, growing nearly 7,000% to assets of $3.55m, albeit from a low base of $50,000 in June.

Other firms comfortably in the black were Apex Clearing Corporation, up 40% on the previous month to $381.6m of assets, and ETrade Futures LLC which reported assets up nearly a fifth (24.7%) to $156.35m.

Charles Schwab Futures and Forex LLC saw its assets increase 23% to $937.4m, UBS Financial Services was up 22.8% to $234.4m, GH Financials boosted assets 22.6% to $230.2m and Santander US Capital Markets was up 21% to $2.49bn of client assets.

Hidden Road, the US credit network which became in January the first new US FCM to start clearing CME Group futures and options in years, reported assets up 6.3% in July to $14.26m.

Clear Street, which launched its US equities and options clearing service in April and hired in July former Cboe Global Markets chief executive Edward Tilly as president, saw its assets increase 1.6% to $298.4m, according to the CFTC report.

The strong FCM numbers reflected active markets in July. Chicago Board of Trade reported volumes up 5.3% in July compared to the previous month, at a total of 192.25 million lots traded, according to FOW Data.

Cboe Exchange, the largest US options market, also had a bumper month, with volumes hitting 192.2 million contracts, an increase of 54% on June, according to FOW Data.

FOW Data also showed New York Mercantile Exchange volumes up 13.2% between June and July, hitting 54.7 million contracts traded that month.

ICE Futures US traded in July 35.4 million contracts, which was down 17.5% on the previous month, according to FIA Data.

The competitiveness of the top US clearing banks has been questioned this year in light of the proposed implementation of the US version of the Basel Endgame bank capital rules in June next year.

Lobby group the FIA said in January the Basel rules combined with the global systemically important banks (G-SIB) surcharge will require the top six US clearing banks to find an additional $7.2bn of capital, representing an 80% increase on their commitments today.

The banks cited by the FIA were Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo.

Michelle Bowman, a member of the US Federal Reserve Board of Governors, in April backed calls for a redrafting of the US regulation.