Derivatives trading witnesses 120% growth in 2011
Derivatives trading volume in 2011 surged 120 per cent on year to 10 million contracts, or an average of 41,145 a day, due to active trading on gold futures and the trading period extension.
In a statement released today, Thailand Futures Exchange (TFEX) revealed that SET 50 Index Futures took the biggest share of trading volume, representing 43 per cent of the total, followed by gold futures, accounting for 40 per cent, and Single Stock Futures having the 16 per cent share.
Comparing with 2010 trading volumes of 4.52 million contracts, or an average of 18,676 contracts per day, TFEX in 2011 showed solid growth of volumes in terms of trading and investors with the valuation of daily average derivatives trading of Bt23.81 billion. The main driver were gold futures trading, which soared three-fold to 3.99 million contracts from 971,423 contracts a year earlier, helped by the spike in gold prices to more than US$1,900 an ounce in the third quarter of 2011, said TFEX Managing Director Kesara Manchusree.
Simultaneously, the launch of the night trading session in June for gold, silver and oil futures also built up volume, enabling investors to boost returns and manage risks to cope with situations in the global market, with trading of gold futures in the night session accounting for 30 per cent of its total trading.
In addition, SET50 Index Futures gained more interest from investors with daily average volume rising 73 per cent to 17,690 contracts in 2011, from 10,212 contracts a year ago, in the wake of stock market fluctuation. Futures were considered as an investment alternative and a risk diversification. Moreover, the increase of the product lines this year also helped boost the trading, such as the launch of 16 single stock futures in March, silver futures in June and oil futures in October.
As of December 30, TFEX had 56,452 outstanding contracts, down 28 per cent from 77,955 a year earlier, and had 62,883 accounts, up 50 per cent from 41,880 accounts in 2010. Domestic Retail investors were the largest group of derivatives players, representing 60 per cent of the total trading, foreign investors accounted for 33.6 per cent and 6.4 per cent came from domestic institutional investors.
