Derivatives trading continues to show very strong growth, with the Chicago Mercantile Exchange reporting that Aug. 31 was its biggest-ever trading day, and August volumes are up sharply overall.

The CME, the largest U.S. futures exchange, said on Aug. 31, the most active trading day in its history, total trading volume was 9.97 million contracts. This broke the previous record of 7.5 million contracts set on June 1.

A number of trading records for specific contracts were broken in yesterday’s session. Volume on the CME Globex platform yesterday was 6.8 million contracts, compared with the previous record from June 1 of 5.1 million contracts. Interest rate contracts reached a record with more than 7.5 million contracts, versus the previous record of 5.2 million contracts on June 1. CME Eurodollar futures and options that were traded on the CME Globex platform posted a record 4.6 million contracts compared with the prior record of 3.3 million contracts.

Average daily volume in August was 3.7 million contracts, up 27% from the same period a year ago. Total monthly volume was more than 85 million contracts. Electronic trading is also gaining in popularity. Average daily volume on the CME Globex electronic trading platform was up 42% from August 2004. It represented 69% of the total CME volume in August, compared with 62% in August last year.