UAE's DME launches new trading platform to attract more participants

Dubai — The Dubai Mercantile Exchange, which lists the Oman crude futures contract, has launched a new platform that allows the trading of several Middle East crude grades in a bid to attract more participants -- nearly a month after the UAE began trading flagship Murban crude futures on a new exchange.

DME has launched Alternative Crude Ecosystem, or ACE, "a new bilateral trading platform to enable participants to trade multiple crude grades through the exchange," it said in an April 5 statement.

The platform will be available for all participants and will offer traders the opportunity to trade bilateral barrels of Dubai, Upper Zakum, Murban, Basrah Light, Basrah Heavy, Al Shaheen and Oman versus the DME Oman Sour Crude Benchmark futures, it added. Upper Zakum and Murban are two of four crudes produced by Abu Dhabi National Oil Co, while Basrah Light and Basrah Heavy are produced by Iraq. Al Shaheen is a Qatari crude grade.

"This new functionality allows Middle East crude participants a way to execute multiple Over the Counter (OTC) crude grades as differentials against DME Oman futures," DME said.

DME's new platform follows the launch of ICE Futures Abu Dhabi, or IFAD, a new exchange on which Murban futures contract began trading on March 29.

The Intercontinental Exchange, ADNOC and nine other energy companies launched IFAD and the Murban futures contract in a bid to create a new Middle East crude benchmark, mainly for oil headed to Asia.

Futures contracts

Murban is the second physically delivered futures contract traded on a regional exchange after DME's Oman crude futures.

Murban is also a deliverable grade in the Platts benchmark Dubai and Oman crude assessments.

S&P Global Platts began publishing April 1 daily Singapore marker prices for the Murban crude 1st line futures contract as reported by IFAD.

Alongside the daily Murban Singapore marker price, Platts is also publishing its spread to same-month Platts Dubai futures, a widely used benchmark to price and evaluate crude oil grades traded in the Asia-Pacific region, Middle East and Far East Russia markets.

The DME Oman is the benchmark for Oman and Dubai crude official selling prices.