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Tuesday, February 26, 2013

CME Group exec chairman leaves door open for possible big deals, (NASDAQ: CME)

CME Group Inc Executive Chairman Terrence Duffy said on Tuesday the trading volume growth of the Chicago-based exchange operator is due to its past acquisitions, and suggested the company may yet have appetite for more big deals. "Whether we do transactions one way or another to build on to the CME Group is yet to be decided," Duffy said on CNBC. "We would not be doing the business we are doing today if we didn't put the pieces of the puzzle (together) over the last few years."Duffy's comments were the first from a CME executive since Bloomberg News reported on Monday that CME has approached rival Deutsche Boerse AG about possible merger talks. Deutsche Boerse said the companies were not in talks, but CME executives had remained mum.CME bought the Chicago Board of Trade in 2007 and the New York Mercantile Exchange in 2008, spending a total of nearly $20 billion and extending its reach into grains, Treasuries, and energy.But since then CME has made only small acquisitions, including the Kansas City Board of Trade for $126 million last year. CME officials have frequently said they do not foresee any new large acquisitions.

CME Group Inc. (CME Group) offers a range of global products across all asset classes based on interest rates, equity indexes, foreign exchange, energy, agricultural commodities, metals, weather and real estate. Shares of CME traded higher by 2.08% or $1.2/share to $58.98. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $49.54 and as high as $60.92. On average, 2169770 shares of CME exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 2874378.



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