Press

Eurex, the international derivatives exchange, reported a total of 183 million contracts traded in March 2008. Compared year-on-year the volume stood at 199 million contracts. The daily average volume was 9.6 million in March; in the first quarter 2008 daily average volume was 9.1 million contracts. Compared to Q1 in 2007 this is a rise of 26 percent (Q1 2007: 7.3 million). In Q1 2008 a total of 570 million contracts were traded compared to 467 million contracts in the first quarter of 2007 (+ 22 percent).
The equity index derivatives segment totaled at 84.5 million contracts, roughly the figure of March 2007 with 87.4 million. Future on the Dow Jones Euro STOXX 50 reached its second-best monthly volume with 40.5 million contracts compared with 30.3 million contracts in February 2008. Turnover of the DAX® future grew by approx. 20 percent compared with previous month and totaled 4.4 million contracts. In the segment equity derivatives, 28.8 millions contracts were traded (March 2007: 31.6 million). The Allianz options were the largest single equity option with 3.9 million contracts. Single stock futures recorded 2.8 million contracts in March.

Around 69.5 million contracts were traded in the fixed income derivatives segment (March 2007: 80 million). Approximately 28 million contracts were traded in the Euro-Bund-Future. Trading volume in the Euro-Schatz Future reached its third-best month with 19.7 million contracts. The Euro-Bobl-Future recorded 16 million contracts, the Euro-Buxl-Future around 213,000 contracts.

The International Securities Exchange (ISE), which belongs to Eurex since the end of December 2007, reached a daily average volume of 4.2 million contracts (March 2007: 2.8 million). In total volume increased by 36 percent to 84.9 million options (March 2007: 62.3 million).

In the first quarter of 2008, Eurex Repo, which operates CHF- and EUR repo markets, set several new records. Its secured money market segment Euro GC Pooling had a new daily record on 24 February with daily outstanding volume of €46.2 billion. Average outstanding volume also reached in the first quarter a new record with €32.7 billion, a plus of 197 percent y-o-y (Q1 08: €10.9 billion). All Eurex Repo markets set a new record with an average outstanding volume of €110.7 billion in the first quarter, an increase of 27 percent y-o-y.

The electronic trading platform Eurex Bonds, which rounds out Eurex’s fixed-income product range, saw a volume of € 9.5 billion (single counting) in March, in February the figure was € 8.5 billion.