Product Highlights During 2005

• Precious Metals – After celebrating the one-year anniversary of launching its Precious Metals complex electronically, the CBOT marked another major milestone, with its Gold contracts (100 oz. and mini-sized futures) capturing a 15 percent market share of gold futures traded in North America based on volume for the month of December. Daily volume for the overall complex reached a record in December, surpassing 20,000 contracts in a single session.
• Interest Rates – Open interest for CBOT Fed Fund options surpassed one million contracts in June, hitting an all-time high record since the contract launched in 2003. The contract’s ADV also rose 39 percent in 2005 to 26,138 contracts. Additionally in 2005, the CBOT’s Two-Year Treasury Note futures contract also grew 125 percent in ADV to 84,821 contracts and set repeat daily and monthly volume records throughout 2005. Further, the CBOT announced a new electronic market maker program for its Two-Year options product in November.
• Equities – Open interest for CBOT $5 mini-sized Dow^SM futures surpassed 100,000 contracts seven times in 2005 and set a new all-time record of 121,015 contracts in December. Average daily volume for the contract rose 21 percent to 98,779 contracts in 2005.
• Commodities – The CBOT’s Ethanol futures contract continues to gain momentum in open interest and attract recognition as a reference price in an emerging industry since the contract launched in March 2005. The contract’s current open interest stands at 781 contracts.

CBOT President and CEO Bernard W. Dan said, “We will remember 2005 as the year we achieved unprecedented milestones in the Exchange’s history and reinforced our position as a global leader in this growing industry. On top of our successful IPO launch in October, the Exchange enhanced its technological presence by implementing a major upgrade to its electronic platform, increasing the availability of our electronic trading platform to 22 hours per day, and relocating our electronic trading platform host to Chicago from London. We also made important progress on our global expansion strategy that included reaching a landmark agreement with the Singapore Exchange to launch a new electronic exchange in 2006, instituting a new telecom hub in Singapore, and launching new working relationships with other Pan-Asian exchanges such as the Sydney Futures Exchange and the Dubai Gold Commodities Exchange to expand our product reach.”

“We experienced strong volume growth in 2005 and are extremely pleased with the performance of our electronically traded contracts. We plan to stay focused on expanding the capabilities of our electronic platform in 2006 and making our liquid markets even more accessible to our global customer base while expanding our product line across different sectors.”

CBOT Achieves 30 ADV Records for the Year (contract volume listed through 12/30/05), including:

• Total Exchange                                                                               2,677,188
• Financial Futures & Options                                                            2,216,364
• Treasury Futures                                                                             1,292,970
• 10-Year Treasury Note Futures                                                         860,496
• 5-Year Treasury Note Futures                                                           487,635
• 5-Year Treasury Note Options                                                            70,766
• 2-Year Treasury Note Futures                                                             84,821
• 30-Day Fed Fund Options                                                                   26,138
• Agricultural Futures                                                                            299,675
• Agricultural Futures & Options                                                           364,572
• Corn Futures                                                                                     110,972
• Mini-sized Corn Futures                                                                           406
• Soybean Futures                                                                                  80,223
• Soybean Options                                                                                 27,054
• Mini-sized Soybean Futures                                                                   1,966
• Soybean Oil Futures                                                                            30,461
• Wheat Futures                                                                                     40,135
• Mini-sized Wheat Futures                                                                         128
• Ethanol Futures                                                                                           14
• Equity Futures                                                                                   105,872
• Equity Futures & Options                                                                  108,762
• $5 mini-sized Dow Jones Futures                                                         98,779
• Metal Complex                                                                                      5,045
• 100 oz. Gold Futures                                                                             2,498
• 5,000 oz. Silver Futures                                                                            343

CBOT’s Average Rate per Contract

The Exchange’s November 2005 three-month rolling average rate per contract rose to $0.541 from $0.516 in October 2005, due mainly to Exchange fee increases implemented October 1, 2005.

Three-Month Rolling Average Rate Per Contract (in dollars)

For more information on CBOT, to view all of the Exchange’s daily and monthly volume and open interest records and details on ADV and volume for December, visit the Exchange’s web site at www.cbot.com.