Hedge fund manager Murray Stahl has bought 13 percent of the seats on the last independent U.S. grain exchange, doubling prices and fueling speculation he may want a platform to trade his fund's products or even to cash in on a potential takeover, industry sources said on Monday. The Minneapolis Grain Exchange (MGEX) survived rounds of consolidation among global exchanges that created giants like CME Group, based in Chicago, and ICE, a network of exchanges including the New York and Euronext stock markets.Founded in 1881, MGEX is still owned by members who pay for a seat which allows them to trade and vote on exchange rules.Its only widely-used contract is booming - spring wheat futures have set volume and open interest records this year as Canadian growers turn to Minneapolis to hedge risk following the break-up of the Canadian Wheat Board's grain monopoly in August of 2012.That could make the exchange an attractive bid target, traders say. Just 18 months ago, CME paid $126 million for the Kansas City Board of Trade and its hard red winter wheat contract in a move to bolster its lucrative grains franchise.
CME Group Inc. (CME Group) offer 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 0.51% or $0.36/share to $70.75. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $58.62 and as high as $84.71. On average, 2065830 shares of CME exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 1201647.
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