In the new world of futures trading crop money never sleeps

By Larry Dreiling

The world of trading grain has changed. Competition for the market's money has become intense in a world where the Oliver Stone movie title "Money Never Sleeps" has become a truism.

The change came with electronic trading on the major traditional U.S. exchanges.

Then, the IntercontinentalExchange, or ICE, began a competition of its own with the traditional U.S. grain trading CME Group.

ICE began in 2000 as an Atlanta-based electronic trading company trading global over-the-counter energy contracts and grew so big as to be able join with the NASDAQ exchange to attempt a takeover of the NYSE Euronext exchange. ICE's intent in its beginning was, its company history describes, to "transform trading by providing an open, accessible, multi-dealer, around-the-clock electronic energy exchange." ICE claimed to offer the energy trading community better price transparency, more efficiency, greater liquidity and lower costs than manual trading.

But on May 14, in response to demand they found from hedge funds and other large traders, the ICE Futures U.S. exchange began trading five U.S. grain and oilseed contracts for corn, wheat, soybeans, soybean meal and soybean oil.

These contracts joined ICE's slate of agricultural futures and options contracts, including sugar, cotton, coffee, cocoa, orange juice, Canadian wheat, barley and canola.

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