China futures market trading volume declined in April

The overall trading activity in the china domestic futures market declined in April. According to the latest data released by the China Futures Association, in April, the total trading volume was about 469 million lots and turnover was about 40.85 trillion yuan, down 26.65% and 15.20% compared to last year’s April, and down 29.26% and 28.23% compared to March, respectively. From January to April this year, the cumulative volume of the China futures market was about 2.003 billion lots, and the cumulative turnover was about 169.46 trillion yuan, down 19.54% and 10.59% year-on-year.

By exchange, in April, the trading volume of SHFE was about 130 million lots, turnover was about 10.51 trillion yuan, down 39.40% and 37.48% year-on-year, down 26.18% and 32.20% month on month, respectively. The volume of INE, a subsidiary of SHFE, was about 7.93 million lots, with a turnover of about 3.25 trillion yuan, up 25.77% and 83.25% year-on-year, down 31.58% and 35.05% month-on-month. The volume of the ZCE was about 163 million lots, with a turnover of about 7.51 trillion yuan, down 27.89% and 19.97% year-on-year, and down 22.23% and 18.42% month-on-month. The volume of the DCE was about 157 million lots with a turnover of about 9.55 trillion yuan, down 14.65% and 10.76% year-on-year, and down 37.67% and 35.75% month-on-month. The volume of CFFEX was about 0.12 billion lots with a turnover of 10.03 trillion yuan, up 21.04% and 5.53% year-on-year, down 19.46% and 18.73% month-on-month.

In terms of product volatility, there is a great disparity in the commodity market in April, with most products showing a monthly volatility of -5% to 5%. Price of Apple futures rose the most, at 13.4%; glass futures price fell the most, at 10.85%.

From the performance of the futures market in the first four months of this year, factors such as the global epidemic continues to spread, the escalation of geopolitical conflicts resulting in important commodities supply shock, the Federal Reserve began to raise interest rates and the ECB exit QE programme will lead to global and domestic commodity market volatility become greater.

The LME nickel incident and the Ukraine crisis also swept the global commodity market, affecting the normal trading of related domestic futures varieties. "However, it can still be seen that in the first four months of this year, China's government bond futures market showed a large increase in turnover size, which reflects the increasing attention and active participation of institutional investors such as domestic financial institutions and investment institutions; at the same time, the entire chemical industry segment showed a year-on-year increase in both volume and turnover; in addition, the oil and grease segment also saw a significant increase in volume and turnover year-on-year.