CME, FXSS See FX Volumes Bounce

Much as was the case with the first group of venues to report FX volumes, CME Group also saw a rise in activity on both its futures and options, and OTC venues, in May.

FX futures and options average daily volume (ADV) in notional terms was $78 billion, a 6.9% rise from April and up 4% year-on-year. Within this, FX options volumes were up 2.6% year-on-year. EBS ADV was $68 billion across spot and NDFs, this is up 4% from April and up 1.5% year-on-year.

In futures, CME says it saw notable increases, on a year-on-year basis, in Cable (+26% to $9 billion ADV), AUD (+31% to $8 billion), CHF (+28% to $4.4 billion) and MXN (+41% to $1.6 billion).

The Merc also says it saw a monthly record of 3.7 million contracts ($368 billion) in Open Interest across its futures and options FX product suite, of which $264 billion was in futures. Separately, CME says it hit its highest-yet level in JPY Open Interest early in June, above 500,000 contracts for the first time, around $49 billion.

The rise in activity came in spite of a further fall in the G5 CVOL Index, which registered 6.4 in May, down from 7.4 in April and the second lowest reading since July 2024. FX Link activity also dipped from April, but was up year-on-year, at $4.1 billion per day activity was down 16.3% month-on-month, but up 41.4% year-on-year.

Elsewhere, FXSpotStream is reported to have also seen a rebound in activity, although The Full FX has not been able to verify the numbers. Activity is reported at $148.4 billion – the fourth highest in the service’s history and up 4.3% from April and up 50.4% year-on-year. Spot ADV is reported at $105.4 billion (+5% and +55% respectively), while non-spot activity was $43 billion (+2.4% and +40.1% respectively).