The London Metal Exchange (LME) announced new records for trading volume and value in 2011 on Thursday.

    Total trading in 2011 rose by 21.9 percent year on year, reaching 146.6 million lots, compared with 120.3 million in 2010, the equivalent of 3.5 billion tonnes of material.

    The notional value of all contracts traded surged by 32.8 percent to 15.4 trillion U.S. dollars, compared with 11.6 trillion dollars a year before.

    "With a 15.4-trillion-dollar notional turnover on the Exchange, and 80 percent of the market share in global metal futures transactions, the LME maintains its leading position in the global metals market," said LME Chief Executive Martin Abbott.

    The base metals had a positive year in 2011. Among the established contracts, LME Aluminium, LME Copper and LME Zinc were the three largest contracts by volume, with 62.8 million, 37.9 million and 23.0 million lots traded respectively.

    LME Lead had the highest growth rate with a 40-percent increase, while aluminium trading rose by 25.5 percent year on year. Market open interest also reached record levels in December at 2.9 million lots.

(Source:Xinhua)