CME Group Reports Drop in FX Trading in Q2, Revenues Grow

CME Group has reported its financial results for the second quarter of 2019, revealing an uptick in revenues year-on-year, but a drop in net income on the same comparison.
During the second quarter of 2019, CME Group reported a revenue of $1.3 billion. This is higher than the $1.1 billion the company reported in the same quarter of 2018 by 20.1 per cent.

Net income attributable to CME Group for the period came in at $514 million, which is lower than the net income of $566 million achieved in the first quarter of 2018 by 9.2 per cent.
In terms of trading, the daily average volume (ADV) for the second quarter increased by 14 per cent year-on-year. As , the firm reported record international volumes for the quarter, with an ADV of 5.4 million contracts. This represents a growth of 24 per cent.
FX trading falls YoY, CME report shows
Breaking down the quarterly ADV into products, the number of foreign exchange (forex) futures and options on futures contracts traded were 874,000. This number is lower than the ADV achieved in every quarter in 2018. It is down 15.5 per cent year-on-year and 1.2 per cent .
Almost all other product lines achieved a yearly uptick in the second quarter, excluding energy and metals. This means, interest rates, equity indexes and agricultural commodities all rose from the Q2 of 2018.
In terms of rate per contract, the average RPC was $0.713 for FX contracts. Again, this is down on a year-on-year comparison. In fact, all products besides metals noted a drop in the average RPC against the second quarter of 2018.
Commenting on the results, CME Group Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Terry Duffy said: “During the second quarter, our clients turned to CME Group to manage their risks amid ongoing global trade concerns, geopolitical unease and Fed policy uncertainty, all of which drove our strong financial results.
“We delivered the second-highest quarterly average daily volume in our history, with 21 million contracts per day, driven in part by record trading volume outside the U.S. and strong options activity, while maintaining our focus on expense control…”