I'm sure the seat prices correlate at least somewhat to the overall price of the stock indexes. Years where the market is going up, the price of seats follows, and years where the markets crash or go down, you can see the price of seats go down as well. That's how I view it anyway. I personally want to see AM memberships go back to around 80k, but that'll take some crisis to see that price again imo.
Correct. Even if you are registered as an Electronic Trading Firm with the CME, you have to either own or lease a seat to get the Member Rates, which is huge. It would be economically impossible to HFT without Member Rates. And there are no economically viable or substantial futures "liquidity provider" programs with respect to CME Futures Contracts. Very, very modest payouts from the CME on that. Where those programs are offered are typically new products - where you would essentially have to bribe someone to make markets in them to begin with. And then it's a shit show... lots of history on that one. Look at the Dubai Oil Exchange, CBOT Insurance Products, etc. etc.
http://www.cmegroup.com/company/membership/international-incentives.html Having a special rate for non North-American entities is little use to US individual/companies ...
Old thread! Prop firms need just one. Corporates trading investor funds (ie all hedge funds) need 2, but one can be leased. Even so, small, finite number.