Record FFA Trading Week at Cleartrade Exchange

Cleartrade Exchange (CLTX), the Singapore regulated futures exchange for commodity derivatives, has recorded its largest weekly trading volume in Dry Bulk Freight Forward Agreements (FFAs), with a total of 18,670 lots recorded, the equivalent of approximately 50% market share.

 “Conditions in the dry bulk freight market have been generally depressed so far in 2015. Whilst the market has remained volatile, record low freight rates have created an overall reduction in FFA activity, with volumes almost 10% down on 2014. It is against this backdrop that I am very happy to report CLTX’s largest ever weekly volume for FFAs,” said Richard Heath, Head of Product, CLTX.

Erlend Engelstad, Market Development Director, Freight and Energy, CLTX, said that rise in volumes shows that the exchange’s initiatives to grow market share in the freight sector are starting to generate success.

“Last week’s increased market volumes were due to a price rally on several forward periods. The general forecast for the rest of 2015 is that rates will remain low however, we are optimistic that if rates do improve, the second half of 2015 will see many more weeks with better FFA volumes,” he went on to say.