ICE energy options latest to hit single day trading records

ICE on Monday hit a single day oil options volume high of 950,233 contracts, beating the previous record of 937,913 lots on June 13 and marking the second single day record this month, according to the exchange.

The ICE oil options total included a record 871,791 lots of Brent options, the exchange said, beating the 818,889 contracts traded on June 13, as hostilities between Israel and Iran roiled markets.

The continuing crisis also led to fresh open interest highs on Monday of 7.24 million lots in all ICE oil options and 4.48 million Brent option contracts, the data showed.

Speaking at the FIA International Derivatives Expo (IDX) event in London last week, ICE president Chris Rhodes said the Atlanta-based exchange has seen options use grow in the last three years as uncertainty has increased.

“In commodities we have seen tremendous growth in our energy options franchise,” Rhodes (pictured) said. “When I rejoined ICE in 2022, we were at about 32 million lots in open interest for commodity options, and now we have about 50 million on a regular basis… When it comes to uncertain probability distributions, it is those products that act as a more granular hedge.”

Total ICE oil futures and options open interest was 17.5 million contracts on Monday, just outstripping the post-tariff bar set on April 24, the data showed.

In addition, ICE’s gasoil futures contract delivered the equivalent of 160,000 tons of gasoil for the June 2025 delivery month, the largest delivery so far this year.

Speaking to FOW from the same event, CME Group global head of commodities markets Derek Sammann said cross-border demand has buoyed activity in the US group's main commodities products.