Unlike the end product, CME’s European cocoa futures contracts have been short and sweet, and with little liquidity.
On Monday, the battle over cocoa trading was won by the Intercontinental Exchange (NYSE:ICE) after CME Group (NASDAQ:CME) announced that it was suspending trading in the fairly illiquid cocoa contracts at Monday’s close.
The CME said cocoa contracts starting with the May 2017 contract would be suspended, although it said the March 2017 contract will remain available for trading with the open interest for the contract unaffected.
The CME launched its cocoa contracts in 2015 in an attempt to challenge the dominance of rival ICE, which oversees two cocoa benchmarks — the dollar-denominated contract traded in New York, and a London benchmark traded in pounds.