Under the agreement, the exchanges will discuss a variety of issues, including cooperation related to product development, information sharing and market regulation.

The Shanghai Futures Exchange was a conglomeration of Shanghai Metal Exchange, Shanghai Cereals and Oil Exchange and Shanghai Commodity Exchange in December 1999. Now the most actively contracts traded though the SHFE are copper, natural rubber and aluminum.

Separately, both the CME and near-neighbour CBOT last week set new volume records for off-floor electronic futures and options trading. At the CME, volume on the after-hours Globex platform totalled just short of 1.6 million contracts, with E-mini S&P 500 futures exceeding one million contracts and E-mini Nasdaq-100 futures and electronic foreign exchange trading also recording their strongest trading day.

Trading volume in E-mini S&P 500 futures totalled 1,003,414 contracts and E-mini Nasdaq futures reached 382,611. Foreign exchange products traded on Globex hit a record 76,216 contracts. Electronic interest rate trading volume was 91,041 contracts, representing one of the busiest days for this product line on the Globex platform.

"As equity markets experienced their most significant upturn in many months, CME's diverse array of futures and options on futures enabled investors to adjust their exposure to stock indexes, foreign exchange and interest rates-and they did so at record levels," says CME chairman Terry Duffy.

The Chicago Board of Trade also announced a new daily volume record on the exchange's electronic trading platform, with 1,332,419 contracts traded on 13 March, surpassing the former record of 1,305,202 contracts set on 27 February, 2003.

Additionally, five-year treasury note futures traded a record 330,731 contracts on the CBOT's electronic trading system, breaking the previous record of 298,410.