The Dubai Gold & Commodities Exchange (DGCX) has had its best start to a year on the back of continued global volatility, trading a total of 1.93 million contracts in January with a value of USD 38.09 billion, beating its previous best January recorded in 2018.
DGCX’s trading activity last month was boosted by a series of significant political events, including the ongoing partial US government shutdown, and heightened trade tensions between the US and China. Various comments made by OPEC in relation to oil production cuts also caused financial market volatility, bolstering the performance of DGCX’s hydrocarbons portfolio, which last month saw Brent Crude Oil Futures and West Texas Intermediary (WTI) Futures record Y-O-Y growth of 61% and 113% respectively.
Les Male, CEO of DGCX, commented: “After an incredibly strong 2018, we have made a very promising start to the year against a volatile backdrop, which saw financial markets, across various asset classes hit recent lows on Christmas Eve, and then rally into the New Year and beyond. The performance of our hydrocarbons products was particularly of note, as well as our Indian Rupee Futures contracts.
DGCX’s Indian Rupee Quanto Future, the index pricing of the Indian Rupee US Dollar currency pair, traded 410,504 contracts and registered Y-O-Y volume growth of 85%, further underpinning the Exchange’s strong start to the year.
“With many major political developments and further instability on the horizon, global markets are likely to continue experiencing sharp bouts of volatility throughout 2019. In light of this, we expect increased demand for derivative products for hedging and investment purposes and we are confident that DGCX will continue to play an increasingly important role for investors within the region,” Male added.
