Soft Futures Landing
The U.S. dollar futures market of the Korea Exchange (KRX) is making a soft landing two months after launch.
After the analysis of trading for two months in the U.S. dollar futures market linked to the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), which was opened in December last year, KRX announced that the daily average trading volume and its trading cost were 138 contracts and 1.51 billion won (US$1.37 million), respectively.
The entire trading volume and trading cost stood at 5,890 contracts and 63.4 billion won (US$57.61 million). The figures are better than the early results of major overseas exchanges, which opened the currency futures market last year, the KRX explained.
Eurex Exchange listed six currency futures in July last year, while the Dubai Mercantile Exchange (DME) listed three currency futures in December last year. Their combined trade volume of the first two months after the list was 199 and 182 contracts. These figures are much lower than the figures of the KRX.
By investors, individuals and foreigners account for 43.3 percent and 54.2 percent, while institutions and companies account for 2.5 percent. This is in contrast to predictions when entering the market. A KRX representative commented on this phenomenon by saying, “We are planning to strengthen promotion and marketing based on stock firms and general companies.”