Eurex, the international derivatives market, says it has enlarged its share of the market in Dutch equity options.
In January 2003, Eurex turned over 518,000 contracts in the Dutch options segment, a 128 per cent increase from the December volume and 317 per cent higher than in January last year. An average of some 25,000 contracts are being traded and cleared per day on the Eurex platform in the meantime.
As a result of the new liquidity-boosting measures introduced in July and the launch of new Dutch products on the same date, the Eurex market share of trading in Dutch equity option contracts increased tenfold within the last year, from one to currently about 10 percent. The market initiative in Dutch equity options also boosted the liquidity in these products substantially. Market makers quote binding bid and ask prices in the order book on a continuous basis. In addition, the maximum term for Dutch equity options was extended to 60 months. Moreover, on July 1, Eurex launched 14 new options on Dutch equities, which means that a total of 23 Dutch equity options are now tradable at Eurex.
Parallel to the ongoing success in the Dutch segment, the liquidity in French equity options at Eurex has also improved considerably. In January, 70,000 equity option contracts on French blue chips were traded and cleared at Eurex, more than six times the number traded the year before (11,000 contracts). Eurex made significant gains in market share, achieving about 10 percent on some days and peaks as high as 20 percent of the total market, measured in terms of the nominal value of the equity options (the nominal value of the transactions). Eurex posted as much as 50 percent of the trading in AXA equity options, and up to 45 percent in L’ Oreal options, its share of the volume in Carrefour and Total Fina ranged between 20 and 25 percent.