CHICAGO (HedgeWorld.com)–The Options Industry Council said that the average daily equity options volume in August was a 9.4% increase over the contracts traded in August 2001. Month-end equity options volume reached 56 million contracts, a 4.6% increase from the same time period last year. The biggest trading day for equity volume occurred on Aug. 16 when almost 4 million contracts traded. Also, August month-end equity open interest reached a new high of almost 90 million contracts, which is a 20% increase of month-end equity open interest in August 2001. Equity open interest is often seen as an indicator of longer-term investing in options instruments, according to the OIC. A portent of things to come, the previous record was set in July with 86 million contracts.–SLB
Options Volume and Open Interest Volume On the Rise at the CBOE
CHICAGO (HedgeWorld.com)–Chicago Board Options Exchange tracked significant gain in volume in index options and open interest last month. August volume totals for index options were up 42% and open interest was up 20% over the previous year’s totals. This is the fourth consecutive month that total index option volume posted gains at the exchange. Average daily volume for index options was up 48% from August 2001. Oddly enough, exchange-wide volume for August totaled 22 million contracts, which is down 1% from the 22.3 million contracts that were traded August 2001. But the average daily volume increased exchange-wide, up 3% versus the year before. .–SLB