The New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) will proceed with its steel futures plan, expecting to launch contracts this year, a senior executive told press this week.
While there had been speculation that NYMEX was planning to delay or cancel its plan to launch steel futures after CME Group bid to take over the company, NYMEX's senior vice president, Robert Levin, said Thursday that the company intends to launch the futures this year and that announcements are imminent.
NYMEX's steel futures plan will initially focus on US hot rolled coil and will be a cash-settled contract. NYMEX signed an arrangement deal with World Steel Dynamics Inc. last year, though NYMEX has not yet confirmed that it will use WSD's steel benchmarker index as a basis for its contracts.
Another exchange has recently launched steel futures contracts -- London Metal Exchange (LME) launched steel billet futures contracts for the Mediterranean and the Far East earlier this year. LME has said that it also intends to launch steel futures trading in North America by year-end.