CME Group, the world's largest and most diverse exchange, announced the extension of its electronic trading hours for mini-sized corn, soybean and wheat futures contracts beginning November 9. The mini agricultural contracts will trade electronically side-by-side with the grains and oilseed products already available in open outcry, which is expected to maximize access for global customers and increase opportunities for both electronic and floor trading.
Electronic trading hours for the mini-sized corn, soybean and wheat contracts will be available from 6:30 p.m. to 6 a.m. and 9:30 a.m. to 1:45 p.m. Central time Sunday through Friday. Electronic market makers will be added to the 6:30 p.m. to 6 a.m. trading hours to enhance liquidity during the Asian and European daytime trading hours.
Mini-sized corn, soybean and wheat futures were launched as Chicago Board of Trade products in April 2003 for floor trading and became available for electronic overnight trading in May 2007. The mini-sized futures will trade on e-cbot® and then migrate to CME Globex® in January 2008, when almost all of the electronically traded legacy CBOT products will transfer to CME Globex, CME Group's electronic trading platform.
Mini-sized corn, soybeans and wheat contracts are each 1,000 bushels per contract and are eligible for directed fungibility with their standard-size grains counterparts, which are 5,000 bushels per contract. The mini-sized contracts are settled using the full-size contract settlement price. For more information, please go to http://www.cbot.com/miniags.com.