LME CEO Froze Nickel Trading Minutes After Waking Up

The head of the London Metal Exchange (LME) spent just 20 minutes on his mobile phone scrolling for news and watching nickel prices lurch higher last year before deciding the market was disorderly and later halting trading, according to a UK High Court document, Kirstin Ridley and Eric Onstad reported for Reuters.

Photo Insert: Before LME Chief Executive Matthew Chamberlain awoke at 5:30 a.m., an LME operations team removed nickel price bands during Asian trading, allowing prices to surge to a record above $100,000 a ton.

The updated filing was lodged by Jane Street Global Trading, a market maker that is suing the LME for $15.34 million after it cancelled around $12 billion of nickel trades. The document outlined fresh details of unprecedented events on March 8, 2022, from information it received from the LME for its case.

Jane Street alleges the world's largest metals marketplace failed to properly investigate chaotic nickel prices, whether the market was behaving rationally and what harm the decision to cancel trades would cause some market participants.

LME, which last year enraged some investors after suspending trading for the first time since 1988, has argued it had both the power and duty to close the market because $19.7 billion of margin calls would have led to the bankruptcy of multiple clearing members and created systemic market risk.

Jane Street's document, filed on March 3 and seen by Reuters on Friday, gives the most detailed account yet of decision-making at the 146-year-old LME one year ago.

Before LME Chief Executive Matthew Chamberlain awoke at 5:30 a.m., an LME operations team removed nickel price bands during Asian trading, allowing prices to surge to a record above $100,000 a ton, the document said.

WEEKLY FEATURE : MVP Group Keeps Lights On During Pandemic