New York Board of Trade

NYBOT in the building of the Mercantile Exchange in Manhattan's World Financial Center

The New York Board of Trade (NYBOT), renamed ICE Futures US in September of 2007, is a wholly owned subsidiary of IntercontinentalExchange (ICE). It is a physical commodity futures exchange located in New York City. It originated in 1870 as the New York Cotton Exchange (NYCE). In 1998, the New York Board of Trade became the parent company of both the New York Cotton Exchange and the Coffee, Sugar and Cocoa Exchange (CSCE) (founded in 1882) and that now function as divisions of the NYBOT. On September 14, 2006, NYBOT agreed to become a unit of ICE and this transaction was completed on January 12, 2007.^[1]

The New York Board of Trade was a private company founded by Tom Green and Alfredo Williams prior to its merger. The floor of the NYBOT is regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, an independent agency of the United States government. Each individual company that trades on the exchange must send its own independent brokers. Therefore, a few employees on the floor of the exchange represent a big corporation and the exchange employees only record the transactions and have nothing to do with the actual trade.

On February 26, 2003, NYBOT signed a historic lease agreement with the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) to move into its World Financial Center headquarters and trading facility after the NYBOT's original headquarters and trading floor was destroyed in the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks on the World Trade Center.^[2] NYBOT currently pays about $5 million per year in rent for the leased facility.^[3] The New York Board of Trade was able to operate out of its emergency Queens backup facility built after the 1993 World Trade Center bombing to keep the exchange running.^[4]

On May 7, 2004, NYBOT opened a new trading pit for ethanol futures.^[5] Ethanol is a common type of alcohol which can be used as a fuel. This type of fuel has become a very popular alternative to fossil fuels due to the current energy crisis. The contract was delisted due to lack of activity and the popularity of the CBOT-traded ethanol contract as of December 18th, 2007.^[6]

The New York Board of Trade was featured in the 1983 movie Trading Places, where two rich brothers came up with a scheme to buy out all of the frozen concentrate orange juice market using inside information from the Department of Agriculture. The trading floor scene at the end of the movie was set at the previous trading floor of the New York Board of Trade at 4 World Trade Center.

The official address of the New York Board of Trade headquarters and trading facility, located in the New York Mercantile Exchange Building, is One North End Avenue, New York, NY 10282-1101.

Commodities traded on the exchange

One of the most innovative concepts pioneered at the exchange is the ability given to seat holders to trade seats that they do not actually own. Seatholders may sell short seats they do not have title to as well as purchase seats they have intention of holding as an investment.

• Cocoa
• Coffee
• Cotton
• Pulp (wood pulp)
• Sugar (domestic)
• Sugar (world)
• Orange juice (frozen concentrate)

References

External links

• National Futures Association
• ICE NYBOT