The Dubai Mercantile Exchange (DME), the Middle East's first energy futures exchange, is delaying the launch of live trading for a further month due to regulatory issues.
DME, which is a joint venture between the New York Mercantile Exchange (Nymex) and Tatweer, a subsidiary of Dubai Holding, was expected to lanuch its Oman crude contract on 1st May.
But the exchange says it is pushing back the launch to 1 June, "subject to regulatory approvals of its clearing arrangement".
"The regulatory, technical and commercial aspects that need to be conceived, considered and acted upon to ensure that the DME succeeds, are necessarily complex and it is essential that absolutely everything is in place when the exchange goes live," says DME in a statement.
The exchange has also rescheduled the production testing of its DME Direct electronic trading platform, which was originally scheduled for 21 April and 28 April. DME says it will reschedule the production testing to 12 May and 19 May, in anticipation of a 1st June launch.
Earlier this week Nymex rival The IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) said it would launch a Middle East sour crude futures contract on its ICE Futures electronic energy exchange on 21 May, some days before DME's original launch date.