London Metal Exchange (LME) has made preparations to scupper New York Mercantile Exchange (Nymex)'s plans to become the first marketplace to offer electronically traded mini base metals contracts after the London exchange announced a launch date in November.
LME said it would launch copper, mini aluminium and zinc contracts, which would be traded only on its online platform Select. The exchange said that the contracts would each be sized at five tonnes per lot, compared to its current lot size of 25 tonnes and would be cash settled against the official settlement price of the full size contract on the cash day for the third Wednesday of each month.
Nymex Europe had planned to launch a similar suite of contracts, but had been prevented by the ongoing dispute between itself and Comex over electronic trading rights.
LME's announcement was looked on by some as an early sign as to...