Trading Statistics for March 2010

Energy transactions up 24% year-on-year

OTC segment: The number of energy¹ transactions rose 24% year-on-year in March, to 36,128, pushing the number of transactions in Q1 ’10 as a whole to 99,116, a new quarterly record .
Exchange and Clearing segment: Overall freight volumes were up 17% year-on-year, at 37,462 lots. The overall number of freight transactions also increased by 11% year-on-year and 19% month-on-month (albeit from low levels in March 2009 and February 2010) with Clearing being the main driver behind the increases.
“Despite continuing difficult market conditions the March figures are promising in several areas, with highlights including surges in the number of dry bulk clearing transactions and energy transactions concluded during the month. Dry bulk volumes within the Exchange segment were still below target,” says Geir Olsen, Acting Chief Executive Officer of Imarex.

OTC segment
The number of energy transactions concluded was 36 128, up 24% year-on-year and up 17% month-on-month, while the volume of energy traded was 1 178 TWh², down 4.8% year-on-year but up 11% month-on-month.

Exchange and Clearing segment
- Tanker and Dry Bulk Derivatives
The volume of dry bulk was 15 949 lots in March, up sharply year-on-year and month-on-month, with Clearing being the primary driver. Dry bulk freight rates can be illustrated by the Baltic Exchange Dry Index for spot rates, which was 2 738 at the end of February 2010 and 2 998 at the end of March 2010. The trade value of tanker futures fell 8% year-on-year – to USD 282 million, while the trade value of dry bulk futures witnessed a five-fold increase year-on-year – to USD 447 million, albeit from a low level in March 2009. Tanker volumes were down 6% year-on-year, at 17 834 lots, but up 18% month-on-month. The volume of freight options was 3 679.
- Freight Open Interest
At the end of the reporting month, open interest for freight options was up 35% year-on-year - to a level of 49 650 lots. Open interest for dry bulk was 27 325 lots and for tanker futures it was 35 745 lots. The open interest is the total number of lots which remain to be liquidated by either close-out trades or delivery at NOS Clearing. NOS Clearing counts only long positions. Other clearing houses often count both long and short positions in their open interest figures.

For more information, please contact:

• Geir Olsen, Acting Chief Executive Officer

             Tel: +47 2389 4211, geir.olsen@imarex.com

Click here for full PDF with charts.

A downloadable Excel spreadsheet with trade statistics and financials is available here

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¹ Excludes metals, weather, uranium, Nordic and Asian business lines.

² All other energy products have been converted to TWh using conversion factors in The Economist Desk Companion (1992) except for Jet Oil and Diesel where conversion factors have been taken from http://www.eppo.go.th/ref/UNIT-OIL.html.