BIS reports global slowdown in derivatives markets

Derivatives market expansion slowed significantly for the period 1998-2001 relative to the three years before, reported the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) today.

Releasing its triennial central bank survey of foreign exchange and derivatives market activity, the BIS reported average daily turnover in over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives markets in April 2001 was US$1.4 trillion, 10% up on the same period three years before. But this represented a “significant slowdown in market expansion relative to the earlier three-year period, when daily activity had expanded four times faster”, said the BIS. Structural changes in foreign exchange markets were largely