The Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) said open interest in security futures passed the 1 million contract milestone for the first time on July 25. At the close of trading open interest stood at 1,031,912 for security futures cleared by OCC and traded at OneChicago and the CBOE Futures Exchange.
Last year, OCC cleared about 2.3 million security futures contracts. Last week, that total had been surpassed and about 2.8 million security futures contracts had been cleared through Monday.
“This open interest milestone signals continued growth of the security futures product and OCC stands ready to efficiently handle continuing volume increases,” said Michael Cahill, OCC President and Chief Operating Officer. “For both futures and options, OCC is a customer-driven clearing organization delivering world-class risk management, clearance and settlement services at a reasonable and transparent cost.”
Open interest is the total number of contracts that have not yet been offset or taken to delivery. It is seen as an indicator of longer term investing in the product.