The London Intercontinental Exchange and the American Mercantile Exchange have their futures trading, which is the benchmark of market oil prices.
The price difference between West Germany Light Crude Oil (WTI) and North Sea Brent Crude Oil (IPE) in the US market is still very large.
Brent crude oil, a light and low-sulfur crude oil produced in Beihai, is also a benchmark quality and widely traded, which is different from the the New York Mercantile Exchange light and low-sulfur crude oil futures contract. Brent crude oil has a daily output of about 500,000 barrels and its origin is Sullom Voe, shetland islands. It is mainly processed and refined in northern Europe, and a small part is processed in the northern east coast of China and the Mediterranean region. Most of these producers still trade in a non-standardized spot way.
In order to improve the effectiveness, liquidity and cost control of the spread trading between Brent crude oil and WTI crude oil, NYMEX set up a public quotation for Brent crude oil futures trading in Dublin trading hall, and traded on NYMEX ACCESS electronic system platform in the rest of the time. The public bidding time is from 10 to 7: 30 pm Dublin time, and the electronic trading time of NYMEX access system is from 8: 00 pm15 to 9:30 am Dublin time.
While improving the practicability of Brent crude oil futures contracts, the Exchange has launched trading platforms of automatic quotation, price report and price difference between Brent crude oil and WTI crude oil, respectively clearing Brent crude oil and light low-sulfur crude oil of NYMEX, which is an important development of the market, because arbitrage transactions in two different markets can be completed through this platform, and it will gradually become a liquid market with transparent price, competitive trading and simple operation.
The exchange believes that arbitrage trading is a kind of transaction, which allows operators to make full use of margin and effectively reduce transaction costs. When long positions offset short positions, the exchange thinks that arbitrage reduces market risk, especially the arbitrage of Brent crude oil futures and WTI crude oil, because these two futures contracts have good correlation, and the exchange provides 95% margin credit for one-to-one Brent /WTI arbitrage trading. The exchange also provided a cost control scheme for Brent crude oil futures contracts, which reduced a lot of operating expenses for market participants. Please click here for details.
Brent crude oil futures contracts are settled in cash, with market data collected by Isilor, Argus and Reuters in Dublin as the index. Brent crude oil futures trading is cleared by the special clearing institution of the exchange, which ensures the safety of funds, among which neutrality, liquidity and market transparency have become the characteristics of NYMEX.
You can try to use Wenhua Finance Software, right-click and select "opt-in contract", then select "ICE" on the left, and then select "crude oil index" to opt-in and confirm. Then you can double-click the "crude oil index" on the watch interface. This shows the trend from 2002 to the present, and I have no further data.