July 2, 1998

I- MONEP equity derivatives

June trading volume in equity derivatives stood at 1,438,358 contracts, up 22.5 % compared with May.
Total open interest at end-June was 1,604,430 contracts, compared with 1,801,245 contracts at the end of May's last trading session (open interest declined because June was an expiration month for short-term CAC40 index options and short-term equity options).
New contracts based on the Dow Jones STOXX® 50 index and the Dow Jones Euro STOXX® 50 index, launched on 22 June, accounted for 5,896 contracts in the month's trading volume.

1/ Options
Total trading volume, at 899,205 contracts, recorded an 18.6 % increase relative to May.
The volume increase amounted to 29.4% for the long-term PXL option on the CAC 40 index and 23.9% for short-term equity options.

Option premium turnover, at FF 7.2 billion, recorded an increase of 9.3% compared with May and 58.1% for the first half of the year.

The most active equity options were the short-term option on Paribas (47,919 contracts) and the long-term option on Axa-UAP (10,806 contracts).

2/ Futures
Volume in CAC 40 futures totaled 533,753 contracts in June, up 28.2% from a month earlier.
An all-time high was reached on 30 June when the June expiry traded at 4,268.

II- MATIF interest-rate derivatives

A total of 3,791,385 interest-rate contracts were traded on Matif in June 1998, a rise of 70.8% on the month of May.

A daily average of 131,988 Notional bond contracts represented a rise of 108.7% from the previous month. Open interest held steady after positions for June 1998 delivery were rolled over to September. Discounting these operations, the Notional contract has steadily increased its share of trading in the 10-year segment since the launch of the NSC-VF electronic trading system on April 7. It was thus up from 15% of total trading in bund and Notional contracts to approximately 25%.

Locals (NCPs) accounted for 21.5% of Matif trade volumes in June, and by June 30, 55 were connected to the NSC-VF electronic system. This is expected to rise to 83 by mid-July.

A total of 288 NSC screens are now in operation, and the figure should reach around 350 by the end of July. One-fourth of these are outside France.

III- MATIF commodity futures

Since January 1998 and notwithstanding a decline in activity this month, the colza futures contract continued to gain ground with volumes up 18% and open interest rising 21.7% on same period of 1997.
After switching from open outcry to electronic trading on June 26, commodity futures now benefit from the same technology as other futures and options.

Appendices:
- Notional bond contracts and Bund futures on Liffe and DTB
- Number of NSC-VF screens connected

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