In battle of top oil exchanges, Nymex gets turbo charge from exports

London

IN the battle for supremacy between the world's two largest oil exchanges, one of them is enjoying a turbo charge from the US government.

Traders bought and sold an average of almost 1.1 billion barrels of West Texas Intermediate crude futures each day in 2016, a surge of 35 per cent from a year earlier. The scale of the gain was partly because of the US government lifting decades-old export limits last year, pushing barrels all over the world, according to CME Group Inc, whose Nymex exchange handles the contracts. By comparison, ICE Futures Europe's Brent contract climbed by 13 per cent.