The New York Mercantile Exchange (Nymex) has announced that it will introduce the first batch of carbon futures and options contracts in March as part of its Green Exchange initiative. The first slate of contracts, which will be launched on 16 March for trade the next day, will include EUA futures and options, as well as CERs futures, it said. The EUA and CER futures contracts will be physically delivered at the UK Emissions Trading Registry, with a contract size of 1000 metric tons of CO2 and a minimum price fluctuation of €0.01 per unit, according to Nymex. The EUA options contract will be a European-style option that will exercise into the underlying EUA futures contract, and the options will expire three business days prior to the EUA futures contract. The new futures contracts will be available for trading on the CME Globex electronic trading platform, and options contracts will be available for trading on the Nymex trading floor. All contracts will be cleared through Nymex’s Clearport system. Nymex has set up the exchange in partnership with Evolution Markets and Icap, both well-established brokers in environmental markets, while large investment banks will trade on the new platform. Nymex next month will also launch seasonal nitrogen oxide emission allowance contracts, annual NOx allowance futures and sulphur dioxide emission allowance options contracts, the exchange said.
