The London Metal Exchange (LME) has approved the application of a British arm of US broker Clear Street for Category 1 membership, giving it access to the LME’s open-outcry trading floor, known as the Ring, the LME said on Wednesday.
Clear Street joining the LME floor trading takes the number of dealing members on Europe’s last open-outcry venue back to eight after Societe Generale said in August that it would leave the floor.
“The arrival of a new member of the calibre of Clear Street demonstrates the LME’s ability to provide a dynamic marketplace for industrial metals and our place at the centre of global metals trading,” LME chief executive Matthew Chamberlain said in a statement.
The LME, the world’s oldest and largest market for industrial metals, proposed closing ring trading three years ago to join other exchanges in offering only electronic trading, but opposition from the physical market prompted a rethink.
Ring trading now operates on a hybrid basis. Open-outcry trading is used for determining official prices used by physical users as benchmarks for their contracts, with an electronic system for closing prices.
Clear Street, which hired several metals traders in London ahead of the move, said the launch of its British arm would help its expansion outside of North America, viewing the UK a gateway to Europe and beyond.
The move “immediately adds to our client service capabilities, particularly for many clients in Asia and the Middle East, who value the Ring’s open-outcry trading for official pricing,” said Chris Smith, head of Clear Street Futures.
Smith was previously the London-based global CEO of ED&F Man Capital Markets, acquired in 2022 by Marex, another LME broker.
(By Polina Devitt; Editing by David Goodman and Louise Heavens)
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