OREANDA-NEWS. January 24, 2008. By the results of 2007, trading volume on FORTS grew threefold (177,4% in rubles) compared with the same value of 2006 and reached its record value, the RTS press service reported. The number of trades increased more than twofold. All in all, on FORTS there were registered 11,7 mln trades with 144,9 mln contracts or 7,5 trillion rubles.

Open interest volume for standard contracts made up at of the end of 2007 141,7 bln rubles or 3,2 mln contracts. Growth in terms of money equaled 67,4%. The highest value of open interest was reached on December 14th - 181,5 bln rubles, and intra-day value last year reached 82,6 bln rubles.

Turnover record on FORTS was registered on December 13th - 126,7 bln rubles or 1,7 mln contracts. Intra-day number of trades increased twofold in comparison with 2006 and reached 47 110 trades.

In 2007, the most liquid contracts were futures on RTS Index (share of this instrument equaled 47,7% or 3,6 trillion rubles). At the same time the highest trading volume of futures on RTS Index - 53,2 bln rubles or 462 825 contracts – was registered on December 13th.

Second position was taken by futures on RAO UESR shares (13,8%). Share of futures on Gazprom shares reached 9,5% in 2007. The most liquid options contracts were options on RTS Index futures (10,1%). Trading volume of futures and options on RTS Index grew almost sixfold in 2007 and reached 180,8 bln dollars against 30,9 bln dollars in 2006. The list of instruments was expanded in quality and quantity on Derivatives market. The number of contracts increased almost threefold. If at the beginning of the year it was possible to settle trades with 23 instruments on FORTS so by the end of 2007 63 contracts were traded on FORTS, of which there were 44 futures and 19 options. Among them there are such unique contracts for Russia as delivery futures on gas oil and sugar, options on gold, futures on silver, bond derivatives, including Federal Bond Loans. There has been created a full-bodied list of derivatives, widely represented by stock, cash and commodity sections.

In 2007, the system of risk management was significantly improved on FORTS.  In May, there was implemented a new system of portfolio margining of open positions, which is in accordance with the best world standards, and also it allowed the market participants to significantly lower the size of initial margin. And since September 2007 there appeared intermediate clearing, which allowed to lower margin for specific contracts by 30%. For instance, margin for futures on RTS Index – the most liquid instrument of the Russian stock market – lowered from 10% to 7,5%. But the whole level of guarantees significantly increased on FORTS. For the end of 2007 the volume of all guarantee funds of the RTS Clearing Center equaled 18 bln rubles.

In 2007, the number of clearing firms on FORTS increased in 22 companies and by the end of the year 132 companies were clearing firms on FORTS. Moreover, the number of clients, carrying out operations on FORTS, grew more than twofold for 10 676 and at of the end of the year reached 23 600 clients.

FORTS Leading Market Participants in 2007

In 2007, leaders of trading volume, including all types of trades, were KIT Finance Ltd., second place keeps Brokercreditservice Ltd., 3rd place occupies OTKRITIE Brokerage house JSC, Investment Company FINAM CJSC. In accordance with the decision of the RTS Derivatives market committee as of July 27th, 2007 RTS publishes several types of trading participants’ ratings, including market transactions and transactions with specified counterparties.