CME

Nasdaq, Inc. NDAQ reported third-quarter 2026 non-GAAP earnings of $1.04 per share, which increased 18% year over year. The figure beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.02 by 1.96%. Net revenues increased 13% to $1.48 billion and topped the consensus estimate of $1.46 billion by 1.4%. Growth was driven by strong Index and Financial Technology performance. Annualized recurring revenues rose 12% to $3.37 billion, with organic growth reaching 14%. Nasdaq, Inc. price-consensus-eps-surprise-chart | Nasdaq, Inc. Quote Solutions revenues advanced 17% year over year to $1.17 billion, representing 79% of net revenues, up from 76% in the prior-year quarter. Organic growth reached 18%, marking the sixth consecutive quarter of double-digit organic growth. Annualized SaaS revenues increased 12% to $1.27 billion, with organic growth of 16%. SaaS accounted for 38% of ARR, reflecting Nasdaq's expanding subscription-based business and recurring revenue contribution. Capital Access Platforms revenues climbed 20% to $641 million. Index revenues surged 39% to $286 million, supported by higher exchange-traded product assets under management and record derivatives volumes. Data and Listing Services revenues rose 10% to $224 million, while Workflow and Insights revenues increased 6% to $131 million. Average Index ETP assets under management reached a record $1.11 trillion, up $331 billion year over year. Net inflows totaled $49 billion during the quarter and a record $141 billion over the trailing 12 months. Nasdaq launched 32 new Index products and welcomed eight of the 10 largest operating-company IPOs during the quarter. Financial Technology revenues increased 16% to $529 million, with organic growth matching the reported rate. Financial Crime Management Technology revenues rose 23% to $103 million, Regulatory Technology revenues advanced 13% to $123 million, and Capital Markets Technology revenues increased 15% to $303 million on a reported basis. Financial Technology ARR increased 18% to $1.95 billion. The division signed 54 new clients, five cross-sells and 135 upsells, while cloud-based solutions represented 85% of annual contract value bookings. Nasdaq Verafin signed 45 small- and medium-sized bank clients and three enterprise deals. Its Agentic AI Workforce expanded to more than 850 clients. Regulatory Technology added 10 new clients and 86 upsells, reflecting demand for cloud infrastructure, AI and regulatory solutions. Market Services net revenues increased 2% to a third-quarter record of $309 million. U.S. cash equities revenues advanced 15% to $114 million, supported by higher market share and a near-record capture rate. European cash equities revenues rose to $30 million, while U.S. tape plan revenues totaled $33 million. U.S. equity derivatives revenues declined 12% to $110 million due to lower capture rates and market share, partially offset by higher industry volumes. Nasdaq held a 28.1% matched market share in U.S. multi-listed options and a 14.5% share in U.S.-listed cash equities. Its European cash equities market share reached 75%. Non-GAAP operating income increased 15% to $843 million. The non-GAAP operating margin expanded 100 basis points to 57%, as revenue growth outpaced the 9% increase in non-GAAP operating expenses to $638 million. Higher compensation costs and technology investments contributed to the expense increase. Cash flow from operations totaled $521 million, while free cash flow reached $616 million. Nasdaq returned $173 million through dividends and $323 million through share repurchases. Cash and cash equivalents stood at $365 million at quarter-end, while long-term debt totaled $8.47 billion. The company's gross leverage ratio improved to 2.5 times from 2.6 times in the preceding quarter, reflecting continued deleveraging. Nasdaq updated its 2026 non-GAAP operating expense guidance to $2.550-$2.580 billion from the previous range of $2.530-$2.570 billion. The revision follows increased compensation costs tied to revenue execution and continued investments in technology. NDAQ maintained its non-GAAP tax rate guidance at 22.5-24.5%. Strategically, Nasdaq established Digital Liquidity Networks to advance digital assets and market modernization. It also completed the acquisition of LeveL Markets early in the fourth quarter and remains on track to introduce 23/5 trading on Dec. 6, 2026, expanding access to U.S.-listed equities. NDAQ currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here. CME Group Inc. CME reported third-quarter 2026 adjusted earnings per share of $3.02, which beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 1.3%. The bottom line increased 12.7% year over year. CME Group's revenues of $1.73 billion increased 13% year over year. The year-over-year increase was primarily due to higher clearing and transaction fees, market data and information services, and other factors. The top line beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 1.2%. Total expenses rose 5.5% year over year to $595.9 million, attributable to higher technology, depreciation and amortization, licensing and other fee agreements, and other expenses. Operating income increased 17.3% from the prior-year quarter to $1.14 billion. Intercontinental Exchange Inc. ICE is set to report third-quarter 2026 results on Oct. 29, before market open. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter earnings per share is pegged at $1.97, suggesting an increase of 15.2% from the year-ago quarter's reported figure. ICE's earnings beat estimates in each of the last four quarters. Cboe Global Markets, Inc. CBOE is set to report third-quarter 2026 results on Oct. 30, before market open. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter earnings per share is pegged at $3.40, suggesting an increase of 27.3% from the year-ago quarter's reported figure. CBOE's earnings beat estimates in each of the last four quarters. Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Nasdaq, Inc. (NDAQ) : Free Stock Analysis Report Intercontinental Exchange Inc. (ICE) : Free Stock Analysis Report CME Group Inc. (CME) : Free Stock Analysis Report Cboe Global Markets, Inc. (CBOE) : Free Stock Analysis Report This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com). Zacks Investment Research

CME Group came into this Q3 2026 earnings print with its stock already on a strong run, and buyers then pushed it another 3.6% higher intraday to about US$306. The headline story is simple: record third quarter revenue of US$1.7b and adjusted earnings per share of US$3.02 put fresh fuel under a futures and options powerhouse that was already priced for quality. The market is responding to volume and fee strength, not a turnaround. Average daily volume reached 29.4 million contracts, and adjusted operating margin landed just under 70%. The move therefore looks less like blind enthusiasm and more like investors paying up for a profitability trend they view as established. Like CME Group's rich margins but want more than one futures giant in your toolkit? Explore a wider field of resilient exchanges and financial infrastructure players with our list of solid balance sheet and fundamentals stocks (25 results). - Revenue (Q3 2026 vs. Q3 2025): US$1,737.3m vs. US$1,534.4m (up about 13%) - Net Income, excl. extra items (Q3 2026 vs. Q3 2025): US$1,036.9m vs. US$896.6m (up about 16%) - Basic EPS (Q3 2026 vs. Q3 2025): US$2.90 vs. US$2.49 (up about 16%) - Adjusted Operating Margin (Q3 2026 vs. Q3 2025): 69.4% vs. 68.0% (up about 1 percentage point) Skip the dense call transcript. Ask Charlie what CME Group's compute futures could change for investors. "Robust international expansion, with record double digit ADV growth across EMEA and APAC and rising participation from both institutional and retail clients globally, broadens CME Group's addressable market and underpins future volume and transaction based revenue growth." CME Group's Q3 print backs this up with hard numbers. Average daily volume reached 29.4 million contracts, up 16% year on year, and international ADV hit 9 million, up 22%. Market data revenue of US$243m, up 20%, shows that usage is deepening, not just widening. Record open interest above 133 million contracts and margin savings above US$100b per day point to clients embedding CME more tightly into their risk processes. "Sell side concerns about competition in key asset classes, including comments that other exchanges are gaining share in energy and that a rival is a threat in rates, could lead investors to reassess CME Group's ability to sustain its role in benchmark contracts, which may pressure revenue growth and put CME's earnings and net margins under scrutiny." The latest quarter does not show that pressure in the reported figures. CME Group posted record third quarter revenue of US$1.7b with adjusted operating margin at 69.4%. Management cited double digit volume growth across all six asset classes, plus records in Treasuries, FX, natural gas and key ag contracts. The 3.6% intraday share move and 3.55% same day gain suggest investors currently view competitive worries as contained rather than confirmed. Not everyone reads the same price the same way. → See the lower figure this Narrative lands on, and how it gets there. CME Group just reminded investors that a dominant market operator can efficiently transform trading activity into profit. The real opportunity is finding stocks that may be undervalued before the market fully recognizes their earnings engines. - Company 1 - 49% below our estimate - uses a cloud-based lending platform and digital checking to deepen primary small business relationships and fee income. - Company 2 - 50% below our estimate - builds recurring fee streams as acquired franchises broaden partnerships and scale noninterest banking services. - Company 3 - 44% below our estimate - integrates a major merger while relying on veteran relationship bankers to expand loans, deposits and specialty fee platforms. That is three of the list. See the full list of 33 companies trading below our fair value estimates → This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned. Companies discussed in this article include CME. Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email [email protected]

Financial derivatives exchange CME Group (NASDAQ:CME) announced better-than-expected revenue in Q3 2026, with sales up 13% year on year to $1.74 billion. Its non-GAAP profit of $3.02 per share was 1% above analysts' consensus estimates. Is now the time to buy CME? Find out in our full research report (it's free). - Revenue: $1.74 billion vs analyst estimates of $1.72 billion (13% year-on-year growth, 0.9% beat) - Adjusted EPS: $3.02 vs analyst estimates of $2.99 (1% beat) - Operating Margin: 65.7%, up from 63.3% in the same quarter last year - Market Capitalization: $106.4 billion CME Group's third quarter was marked by robust volume growth across all six asset classes, as management cited shifting central bank policies, geopolitical uncertainty, and persistent market volatility as primary catalysts for heightened client activity. CEO Terry Duffy emphasized that average daily volume reached a new third-quarter record, with international markets showing notable strength. The company highlighted continued momentum in market data services and capital efficiencies for customers, supporting its above-consensus revenue and profit despite a lack of significant market reaction to the results. Looking forward, CME Group's leadership pointed to ongoing product innovation, regulatory-driven changes in Treasury clearing, and a focus on expanding 24/7 trading as central to its strategy. Duffy stated, "Innovation will continue to be a key driver of our performance and our ability to serve our clients effectively," while also acknowledging the importance of maintaining market integrity and client protection. The migration to cloud infrastructure and the rollout of new offerings such as Single Stock futures and Compute Futures are expected to shape the company's trajectory over the coming quarters. Management attributed the strong third quarter to broad-based growth in trading activity, the launch of new products, and deeper engagement across its global client base. - International volume acceleration: International average daily volume rose 22% year-over-year, led by 40% growth in energy products, 28% in agricultural products, and 24% in equity index products, reflecting increased demand for CME's risk management tools outside the U.S. - Product launch momentum: Several new products, including Single Stock futures and E-nano Equity Index futures, were introduced, with Single Stock futures quickly gaining traction among both institutional and retail clients, and providing new margin efficiency opportunities. - Market data revenue milestones: Market data revenue set an all-time quarterly record, driven by a broader subscriber base across professional, retail, and simulation platforms, as well as increased demand for real-time pricing and data feeds amid global volatility. - Capital efficiency gains: Customers saved over $100 billion a day in margin requirements, with growth in cross-margining programs, especially in swap and equity products, and new portfolio margining participants using CME to optimize capital usage. - 24/7 trading expansion: Building on the initial success of around-the-clock trading in gold, silver, and cryptocurrencies, CME expanded 24/7 access to additional contracts and is exploring further asset classes, though regulatory and infrastructure challenges remain for larger markets. CME Group expects continued product innovation, regulatory changes, and infrastructure modernization to drive volume and margin performance in the near and medium term. - Regulatory-driven opportunities: The upcoming Treasury clearing mandate is anticipated to boost demand for CME's clearing services and related products, with the launch of CME Securities Clearing positioned to capture new client flows tied to regulatory changes. - Product and technology expansion: Management is focused on launching new products such as Compute Futures and expanding the 24/7 trading model, while also progressing with the Google Cloud migration to offer clients greater flexibility and reliability. - Market structure shifts: Changes in client risk management needs, fueled by volatility, AI infrastructure growth, and evolving trading behaviors, are expected to support ongoing volume growth, though management cautioned that full realization of some initiatives depends on regulatory approval and broader market infrastructure changes. In the coming quarters, the StockStory analyst team will watch closely for (1) regulatory developments impacting Compute Futures and the Treasury clearing mandate, (2) uptake and client engagement with new products such as Single Stock futures and 24/7 trading contracts, and (3) measurable progress in the migration to Google Cloud infrastructure. The pace of growth in capital efficiency programs and international expansion will also be important signposts. CME Group currently trades at $296.14, in line with $295.31 just before the earnings. Is the company at an inflection point that warrants a buy or sell? The answer lies in our full research report (it's free for active Edge members). ONE MORE THING: Top 6 Stocks for This Week. This market is separating quality stocks from expensive ones fast. AI is taking down whole sectors with no warning. In a rotation this fast, you need more than a list of good companies. 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CME Group (CME) came out with quarterly earnings of $3.02 per share, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $2.98 per share. This compares to earnings of $2.68 per share a year ago. These figures are adjusted for non-recurring items. This quarterly report represents an earnings surprise of +1.34%. A quarter ago, it was expected that this parent company of the Chicago Board of Trade and other exchanges would post earnings of $2.91 per share when it actually produced earnings of $2.99, delivering a surprise of +2.75%. Over the last four quarters, the company has surpassed consensus EPS estimates three times. CME, which belongs to the Zacks Securities and Exchanges industry, posted revenues of $1.74 billion for the quarter ended September 2026, surpassing the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 1.43%. This compares to year-ago revenues of $1.54 billion. The company has topped consensus revenue estimates three times over the last four quarters. The sustainability of the stock's immediate price movement based on the recently-released numbers and future earnings expectations will mostly depend on management's commentary on the earnings call. CME shares have added about 8.1% since the beginning of the year versus the S&P 500's gain of 12.7%. While CME has underperformed the market so far this year, the question that comes to investors' minds is: what's next for the stock? There are no easy answers to this key question, but one reliable measure that can help investors address this is the company's earnings outlook. Not only does this include current consensus earnings expectations for the coming quarter(s), but also how these expectations have changed lately. Empirical research shows a strong correlation between near-term stock movements and trends in earnings estimate revisions. Investors can track such revisions by themselves or rely on a tried-and-tested rating tool like the Zacks Rank, which has an impressive track record of harnessing the power of earnings estimate revisions. Ahead of this earnings release, the estimate revisions trend for CME was favorable. While the magnitude and direction of estimate revisions could change following the company's just-released earnings report, the current status translates into a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy) for the stock. So, the shares are expected to outperform the market in the near future. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here. It will be interesting to see how estimates for the coming quarters and the current fiscal year change in the days ahead. The current consensus EPS estimate is $2.99 on $1.75 billion in revenues for the coming quarter and $12.31 on $7.05 billion in revenues for the current fiscal year. Investors should be mindful of the fact that the outlook for the industry can have a material impact on the performance of the stock as well. In terms of the Zacks Industry Rank, Securities and Exchanges is currently in the top 34% of the 250 plus Zacks industries. Our research shows that the top 50% of the Zacks-ranked industries outperform the bottom 50% by a factor of more than 2 to 1. One other stock from the same industry, CBOE Global (CBOE), is yet to report results for the quarter ended September 2026. The results are expected to be released on October 30. This holding company for the Chicago Board Options Exchange is expected to post quarterly earnings of $3.40 per share in its upcoming report, which represents a year-over-year change of +27.3%. The consensus EPS estimate for the quarter has been revised 0.2% higher over the last 30 days to the current level. CBOE Global's revenues are expected to be $701.96 million, up 15.9% from the year-ago quarter. Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report CME Group Inc. (CME) : Free Stock Analysis Report Cboe Global Markets, Inc. (CBOE) : Free Stock Analysis Report This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com). Zacks Investment Research

This article first appeared on GuruFocus. Release Date: October 21, 2026 For the complete transcript of the earnings call, please refer to the full earnings call transcript. - Record Q3 2026 average daily volume of 29.4 million contracts, up 16% year-over-year, with double-digit growth in all six asset classes. - Record Q3 revenue of $1.7 billion, up 13% year-over-year, with market data revenue reaching a record $243 million, up 20%. - Adjusted operating income of $1.2 billion, up 15% year-over-year, with a strong adjusted operating margin of 69.4%. - Record international average daily volume of 9 million contracts, up 22% year-over-year, driven by growth in EMEA and APAC. - Record capital efficiencies, saving customers an average of over $100 billion per day in margin savings, enhancing client retention and attracting new participants. - Regulatory delays for new products like Compute Futures and 24/7 WTI oil contract, with the CFTC extending comment periods and industry pushback. - Open interest growth was modest in key asset classes (equities up 0.2%, interest rates up 1.2%, energy down 3.6%), with volume growth driven more by velocity than open interest. - Pricing changes implemented in October are expected to have a modest impact of only 0.5-1% on clearing and transaction fees, limiting revenue upside. - Uncertainty surrounding perpetual futures and potential systemic risks, with legal and regulatory outcomes pending. - Heavy reliance on institutional clients (94% of business), with retail growth still emerging and facing competition from platforms potentially listing their own products. - Warning! GuruFocus has detected 5 Warning Sign with CME. - Is CME fairly valued? Test your thesis with our free DCF calculator. Q: Can you provide an update on the Compute Futures product, including the regulatory timeline and client feedback? A: CEO Terry Duffy explained that the CFTC has extended the comment period, which ends November 9, and the timeline for approval remains unknown. He emphasized the strong need for the product, stating that "people are contacting us that are looking... about how they need to manage this risk." Derek Sammann added that there is "a tremendous source of client engagement" from neo-cloud players, data center operators, and banks, and that the product is ready for regulatory review. Q: What is the strategy behind 24/7 trading, and why was the 10-barrel WTI filing withdrawn? A: CEO Terry Duffy stated that while 24/7 trading for gold, silver, and crypto has been successful, the WTI filing was withdrawn to respect the concerns of commercial participants who did not want to staff up another desk. He noted, "I'm a big believer... the market's ultimately going to 24/7 on all products," but stressed that this requires infrastructure, particularly a 24/7 banking system, to support it. Q: Can you discuss the drivers behind the record $100 billion in daily margin savings? A: CFO Lynn Martin noted the savings are broad-based, driven by increased activity and open interest across all asset classes. Tim McCourt added that in the equities complex, approximately 60% of the increase in 2026 came from new positions established at CME, with the other 40% from rising asset levels. He highlighted the growth in OTC swap alternatives like dividend futures, which saw open interest grow 30% year-over-year. Q: What is the outlook for the market data business, which has seen 20% growth? A: Julie Winkler explained the growth is driven by a diverse mix: one-third from an expanding professional subscriber base, one-third from retail and SIM platforms, and the remainder from increased data feed demand and pricing adjustments. She noted that over 50% of the demand comes from outside the U.S. and that data is a "leading indicator for our markets," though she did not provide specific future growth expectations. Q: Can you provide an update on the CFTC perpetuals lawsuit and its potential strategic implications? A: General Counsel John Marchese stated, "We are very confident in our position" and expect the case to be fully briefed before the judge in December. CEO Terry Duffy declined to speculate on whether CME would list its own perpetuals if the case is dismissed, stating, "We'll make that decision if and when the time comes." He reiterated his view that perpetuals are swaps, not futures. Q: What were the key concerns that led to the withdrawal of the 24/7 WTI oil contract filing? A: CEO Terry Duffy explained that commercial participants were concerned about the cost and logistics of staffing up another desk to support 24/7 trading. He stated, "We respect that there's cost of moving to 24/7 on any product," and that CME wanted to be "mindful, respectful of the commercial participants." He also expressed surprise at the regulatory hold-up, given that U.S. participants are already trading on overseas markets over the weekend. Q: Can you provide an update on the single stock futures product and its distribution strategy? A: Tim McCourt reported strong early performance with over 350,000 contracts traded, representing about $3.5 billion in notional value. He noted global participation and a distribution strategy targeting over 130 retail firms and several dozen FCMs. Julie Winkler added that for institutional clients, the product is a "capital and margin efficiency play," while for retail, it's an "options alternative" without time decay. Q: What is the status of the TreasuryLink initiative? A: Mike Dennis announced that TreasuryLink is now live in the new release environment for client testing. He described it as an "industry-first treasury functionality" that enables transparent, centralized spread trading between treasury futures and cash treasuries. He noted strong demand from both existing and prospective participants and sees it as the next step in bringing cash and futures markets closer together. Q: How should we think about capital priorities, specifically regarding M&A versus buybacks? A: CFO Lynn Martin emphasized the flexibility of the capital return policy, including variable dividends and share repurchases. She stated that while CME has the ability to flex for inorganic opportunities, "we have tended over time to be a lot more choosy when it comes to M&A." CEO Terry Duffy added that CME's low debt load puts it in an "advantageous situation" but that the company remains focused and disciplined, not shopping for acquisitions just to buy. Q: Can you elaborate on the pricing changes that went into effect in October? A: CFO Lynn Martin stated the changes are expected to have an annualized impact of "half to 1% of the clearing and transaction fees." The adjustments were made in crypto, grains, interest rate tiers, and micro equities. She noted that CME is moving away from a single annual price increase to a more spread-out approach, implementing changes when value is created in the marketplace. Q: What is the potential impact of the new CBOE S&P licensing deal on your JV? A: CEO Terry Duffy explained that as a partner in the JV, CME will benefit from the 25-year licensing extension. He highlighted that the economic benefits from potential price escalations will begin in 2027, not 2032, putting CME "five years ahead of time and getting paid at a higher rate." He called it "a winning proposal from CME's perspective and our shareholders." Q: How are you thinking about the next asset classes to bring to 24/7 trading? A: CEO Terry Duffy believes the market is ultimately heading to 24/7 trading for all products. However, he stressed the need for supporting infrastructure, particularly a 24/7 banking system. He stated, "It's going to be harder and harder for anybody to list a primary product until the infrastructure of the banking system goes 24/7 because that's what lends credibility to the participant and makes certain that we have the liquidity and the back office support." For the complete transcript of the earnings call, please refer to the full earnings call transcript.

Image source: The Motley Fool. Wed, Oct 21, 2026 - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer - Terry Duffy - General Counsel - John Marchese - Investor Relations - Adam Minick - Chief Financial Officer - Lynne Fitzpatrick - Derek Sammann - Tim McCourt - Julie Winkler - Mike Dennis Operator: Welcome to the CME Group third quarter 2026 earnings call. At this time, I would like to inform all participants that your lines have been placed on a listen-only mode until the question answer session of today's conference. I will now turn the call over to Adam Minick. Please go ahead. Adam Minick: Good morning, and I hope you're all doing well today. Earlier this morning, we released our earnings commentary, which provides extensive details on the third quarter 2026, which we will be discussing on this call. I'll start with the safe harbor language, and then I'll turn it over to Terry. Statements made on this call and in the other reference documents on our websites that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements. These statements are not guarantees of future performance. They involve risks, uncertainties, and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Therefore, actual outcomes and results may differ materially from what is expressed or implied in any statement. Detailed information about factors that may affect our performance can be found in the filings with the SEC, which are on our website. Lastly, in the earnings release, you will see a reconciliation between GAAP and non-GAAP measures following the financial statements. With that, I'll turn the call over to our Chairman and CEO, Terry Duffy. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Adam, and thank you all for joining us this morning. I'll make a few comments about our exceptional third quarter performance before turning it over to Lynne to provide an overview of our financial results. In addition to Lynne, we have other members of our management team present to answer questions after the prepared remarks. Against a backdrop of shifting central bank policies, geopolitical uncertainty, and persistent market volatility, global participants continue to turn to CME Group in record numbers. The third quarter average daily volume of 29.4 million contracts was the highest third-quarter average daily volume in CME Group's history and increased 16% compared to the same period last year. This strong growth was broad-based as we achieved double-digit year-over-year volume growth in all 6 asset classes. Our financial and commodity products volume each grew by 16%. Beyond the strong volume growth, the underlying health of the business is perhaps best reflected in the strength of our open interest and the significant capital efficiencies we provide to our customers. Quarter end open interest reached 128 million contracts, and today it is over 133, the highest open interest at the end of September in our history. As I said, this open interest continues to grow in October. We also set a record for a number of large open interest holders in both our interest rates and foreign exchange complexes in September. Additionally, we delivered record levels of capital efficiency in the third quarter, saving our customers an average of over $100 billion a day in margin savings. This was a record third quarter for our international business as well, where average daily volume reached 9 million contracts, up 22% versus last year. This was led by 6.5 million average daily volume from EMEA, which was up 20%, and 2.1 million contracts per day from APAC, up 28%. The record international volume was driven by growth in energy products, up 40%, agricultural products were up 28%, and equity index products were up 24%. To support our customers, product innovation remains central to our strategy. During the quarter, we launched several new products, including Single Stock futures and E-nano Equity Index futures. We also expanded 24/7 trading to both our 1-Ounce Gold and 100-Ounce Silver contracts, building on the strong traction of our 24/7 cryptocurrency products launched earlier this year. Looking ahead, we are on track for our December 7 launch of CME Securities Clearing in advance of the SEC's Treasury clearing mandate. Innovation will continue to be a key driver of our performance and our ability to serve our clients effectively. However, true innovations must always be anchored in market integrity, financial safeguards, and client protection. Innovation without real risk management is not progress. It has the potential to create systemic risk. CME Group remains committed to ensuring market integrity and will never sacrifice core protections in the name of innovation. Instead, we continue to launch innovative products while preserving the safety and soundness of our marketplace. Technology innovation must also be responsive to client needs. As part of our ongoing cloud migration with Google Cloud, we opened the Dallas disaster recovery facility for client testing in June. The performance of that infrastructure has been positive, with latency and consistency as good or better than our on-premises offering. The primary Chicago region continues to progress to plan, and we expect to begin this cloud migration of our markets in late 2027. Given this timeline and the positive testing to date, we have determined that in the interim, relocation of our livestock markets to Dallas is no longer necessary. Next-generation market participants require premier technology optionality. CME Group is uniquely positioned as the only global exchange offering clients the dual advantage of Google Cloud managed services alongside ultra-low latency co-location. It is clear that market participants continue to turn to CME Group to navigate a complex and rapidly evolving global economy. I am incredibly proud of what we achieved this quarter, and I am highly confident in the opportunities ahead of us. With that, I will hand the call over to Lynne to discuss our financial performance in more detail. Lynne Fitzpatrick: Thanks, Terry, and thank you all for joining us this morning. As Terry mentioned, CME Group generated impressive third quarter financial growth. Revenue of $1.7 billion was up 13% from the third quarter in 2025. This marks a record for third quarter revenue in aggregate and included a new all-time quarterly record for market data at $243 million. Market data revenues were up 20% and delivered the 34th consecutive quarter of year-over-year revenue growth. Adjusted expenses were $532 million for the quarter and $428 million excluding license fees. The strong growth in volume this quarter, led by our equity complex, up 23%, resulted in an increase in license fees, which are primarily related to equity activity. Our revenue growth and operating leverage resulted in an adjusted operating income of $1.2 billion, up 15% year-over-year, or 69.4% adjusted operating margin. Adjusted net income was $1.1 billion, resulting in adjusted diluted earnings per share of $3.02, up 13% from Q3 2025. Our adjusted net income margin for the quarter was 62.4%. Reinforcing our commitment to disciplined capital returns, we returned nearly $1 billion to shareholders during the quarter, with $465 million in regular quarterly dividends and $524 million in share repurchases. The third quarter results underscore CME Group's position as the primary destination for global risk management, delivering double-digit volume growth across every single asset class through double-digit gains in both revenue and earnings, resulting in the second highest revenue, adjusted net income and earnings per share of any quarter in our history. Through the first 3 quarters this year, our revenues have grown by 9% and our adjusted earnings per share by 11%. Our strong year-to-date momentum reflects robust client demand across our global benchmark products and continued innovation to best serve our clients. As we enter the fourth quarter, volume is surpassing last year's record fourth quarter by 17%, and we are tracking 12% ahead of last year's record volume year-to-date. As we remain firmly on track to deliver another record year, our focus remains on delivering deep liquid markets and maximizing capital efficiencies for our clients and strong earnings for our shareholders. We would now like to open up the call for your questions. Operator: The phone lines are now open for questions. If you would like to ask a question over the phone, please press star one and record your name. To withdraw your question, press star 2. The first question in the queue is from Chris Allen with KBW. Your line is now open. Chris Allen: Yeah. Morning, everyone. I wanted to ask on Compute Futures. I know the CFTC extended the comment period. Just wondering if you see any hurdle to launching this product. Judging by our review of the comments, it doesn't seem like any real pushback there. Maybe any update on client feedback, appetite for Compute Futures, and then whether you are seeing any incremental impact from hyperscalers and data centers within the energy product complex. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Chris. Chris, it's Terry Duffy. I'm going to start, and I'll let Derek make some comments as well. On the client development, Derek can touch on, because Derek and I and PV all have been working with clients on the street as it relates to Compute Futures and what they mean for their portfolios and their businesses. As far as the timing of the agency goes, that is still unknown. As you know, they extended the comment period another 45 days, which ends, I believe, on November 9. Then they have to make a decision on what they want to do. We think this is a product that needs to get out. When you look at all the conversation around data centers, AI, hyperscalers, chips, we have people contacting us that are looking, and Julie Winkler can reference it, about how they need to manage this risk in this ever-changing landscape that they're in. I would hope that the government would allow this product to move forward sooner rather than later. But again, it's in their hands right now, and there's not much more we can do until we get the approval from the government. As you know, this was filed under a 40.3, which is a full review of the process, and we respect the processes. We'll look forward to that going forward. Again, I think we're playing the long game as it relates to Compute Futures, but we want to make sure we get this product up, launched so that people can manage their risk. Derek, I'll let you talk a little bit more about the client space. Derek Sammann: Yeah. Thanks, Chris. I think this has been a tremendous source of client engagement. If you think about how we've been working on this, we've seen this opportunity talking to our customers. We've been working on Compute for almost 2 years now. Given the nature and the scale of our energy franchise, where this sits so nicely in connection to our Nat Gas franchise and the rest of our hedging tools, we're the natural partner for customers to partner with to develop new products. So, looking at this over the last 2 years, we've spent a lot of time looking at different indexers and PRAs and providers. We landed on Silicon Data as what we think the most robust provider of data. We see them providing data observation at huge scale across dozens of platforms and thousands of data points and all types of transactions. We also see them having a robust data set out across the forward curve, and that's crucial for developing an index that is going to be the basis for a futures contract. Another important point is the Silicon Data index is already IOSCO compliant, meaning it's globally ready to be adopted by the community for the benchmark product itself. In terms of the client participation base, we're seeing really early adoption coming from the neocloud players, data center operators, banks. If you think about the banks, they're significantly exposed to the AI infrastructure on their leverage portfolios and where they're lending for the growth there. So their exposure to the AI sector creates an unhedgable risk. This is a solution for that. We've also seen a lot of interest from funds and props, and as it relates to potential cross-sell opportunities, much like we saw when we built out Battery Metals. This is bringing new commercial customers into our orbit that previously haven't used our products to manage the risk in their portfolios. So this is opening new opportunities with chip providers and different kinds of participants that we can actually cross-sell opportunities into. I think it's early days. As Terry said, we're ready to go. We're waiting for regulatory review. But I can say definitively this product has a significant amount of client demand, and the Street is eager to be able to access these. Chris Allen: Thanks, Gus. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Gus. Operator: The next question is from Patrick Moley with Piper Sandler. Your line is open. Patrick Moley: Good morning. Thanks for taking the question. I had one on 24/7 trading. Gold and silver are now trading around the clock, and I think in the deck you said weekend volumes were at about 20%-30% of those contracts ADV, so there's clearly demand there. You did withdraw the 10-Barrel WTI filing after the CFTC stay and the industry pushback that you cited. Could you just walk us through maybe what the key constituents' concerns actually were there and what the path and timeline is to maybe bringing 24/7 energy back? Then maybe more broadly, just how are you thinking about which asset classes you could potentially bring 24/7 next? Thanks. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Patrick, and you highlighted the success we've had with both the gold, silver, and the cryptocurrencies trading 24/7. As we move forward and listed our put forth an application for our 24/7 small 10-barrel oil contract, we're trying to give the marketplace an opportunity to hedge over the weekend as they are doing today, even though participants are trading on what is called a VPN, and they're trading overseas on markets that our U.S. participants are not supposed to be participating on. Yet we have not seen any evidence of any policing of that activity. I'm very surprised by that, to be honest with you. I'm surprised our 24/7 oil got held up. Let's talk about that for a second, why, from the commercial side. Commercials are looking to make sure that they have the big contract where they want it, and we support that. They did not want to staff up another desk. We respect that. We respect that there's cost to moving to 24/7 on any product, and this one in particular as well. We wanted to be mindful, respectful of the commercial participants and what they're hearing today. I think the bigger question is: What is the agency doing and what are others doing to make certain that U.S. participants are adhering to U.S. law? For now, we heed the advice of the commercial participants, and we will hold off on listing that contract till people are more comfortable. As far as other products go, did you say, Patrick? Patrick Moley: Yeah, just how do you think about which asset classes to bring 24/7 next? What makes sense? Terry Duffy: I'm a big believer, and I've said this publicly, too, Patrick, as you know. When you go to 24/7, I think the market's ultimately going to 24/7 on all products, but you need to have the infrastructure to support 24/7. As I've said, the U.S. equity market alone is $76 trillion. Nobody can prefund that on a Friday. It's really important that we have an infrastructure in the United States that's set up to handle 24/7 markets, not just for crypto, not just for maybe a small silver, gold, or oil contract, but for our primary products. It's going to be harder and harder for anybody to list a primary product until the infrastructure of the banking system goes 24/7, because that's what lends credibility to the participant and makes certain that we have the liquidity and the back office support in order to run those markets. Patrick Moley: Okay, great. Thanks, Terry. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Patrick. Operator: The next question is from Alex Kramm with UBS. Your line is open. Alex Kramm: Yes. Hey, good morning, everyone. Actually, just a quick numbers question, if I can. On the below the line items, the interest income, on a net basis kind of surprised me a bit. I think the clearing house assets went down, I think a couple of percent quarter-over-quarter, but I think the net interest went down 8%. I know there's a few other things that go in there in terms of your own cash and obviously rates environment. Just maybe you can just give us a detailed view quarter-over-quarter, what exactly happened there, so we can maybe model it a little bit better. Thanks. Terry Duffy: Yep. Lynne? Lynne Fitzpatrick: Sure, Alex. So if you look at the cash at the clearing house, the average balances for the quarter were $147 billion in Q3. That was down from about $150 billion in Q2, with a similar return of about 33 basis points that we earned. We did have an increase in our corporate cash. We had about $27 million in earnings on that in the quarter. You obviously then have the JV income that is rolling through that line. Interest expense was relatively flat, so it was really the balance changes that you're seeing roll through there. Alex Kramm: Easy enough. Thank you. Operator: The next question is from Dan Fannon with Jefferies. Your line is open. Dan Fannon: Thanks. Good morning. I was hoping to talk about pricing. If you could talk to the changes that went into effect here in early October in more detail, as well as the potential implications to you from the changes in the Cboe S&P licensing deal through your JV ownership. Terry Duffy: Yeah. Thanks, Dan. Good question. I will let Lynne go ahead and start on the pricing, and I might touch on the Cboe one as well. Lynne Fitzpatrick: Okay. On the pricing side, we did have some impacts that were implemented here on October 1. We are expecting, if you look at an annualized basis, those to have an impact of somewhere in the range of 0.5%-1% of the clearing and transaction fees. I would say the lines where you are seeing those changes, they are going to be in crypto, some in our grains complex. We did adjust some of the tiers in interest rates and then the micro equities as well. Just to keep in mind, we did have some pricing changes in April. We are moving away from having that annual pricing freeze, and we are looking at doing it more spread out over the course of the year when we see changes in marketplaces, when we see value creation at that point. That is what this is reflective of. Terry Duffy: Dan, on the Cboe licensing agreement, obviously, we all know it's a 25-year extension they put forward. There's a couple of interesting points in that. As you know, we're a partner in the JV, so we benefit from that licensing agreement with Cboe. What's really interesting about that is we benefit starting in 2027 on potential increases, not 2032 because their agreement, the escalation of the pricing starts in 2027. What those are exactly is yet to be disclosed from both Cboe and S&P Global. But we know that we've been working with our partner at S&P Global, and we know that they do escalate. So whatever they are, we'll wait to see like everybody else. But we know we're in a much better situation economically with the S&P deal going forward, and we're there actually 5 years ahead of time and getting paid at a higher rate. We'll wait and see till they report on what exactly the nuance of the numbers are, but from our seat, it's very much a winning proposal from CME's perspective and our shareholders. Dan Fannon: Thank you. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Dan. Operator: The next question is from Michael Cyprys with Morgan Stanley. Your line is open. Michael Cyprys: Hey, good morning. Thanks for taking the question. I wanted to ask about Single Stock futures. I was hoping you could talk about the distribution strategy as you're working with retail brokers on the product, what the feedback has been. And then related to that, given you already have a prediction market today, I guess what's the scope to potentially introduce prediction markets on single stocks, kind of equivalent to maybe a Single Stock future, but more of a prediction market contract? Do you think there might be appetite for that? And what might be the required build there? Terry Duffy: So 3 questions that you asked there, Michael, and I'm going to ask Tim McCourt and maybe Julie Winkler to chime in as far as the distribution, the clients, and then I'll talk a little bit about the prediction side of your question. So Tim, I'll start with you. Tim McCourt: Yeah, Michael, appreciate the question. So we launched Single Stock futures and off to a good and strong start for that product. We've done a little bit over 350,000 contracts since launch with about $3.5 billion of notional. And I think what's important to note when we look at the distribution, we have 2 sized products. We have the 100-share multiplier across 55 of the largest names in the U.S., and we have the 10-share multiplier across 22 names of a subset of the 55. When we look at the distribution strategy, it's really a continuation of making sure that all market participants, whether they're institutional or individual traders, have the products they need to access these markets and manage their risk. When we look at the distribution, I think the one thing that we're encouraged by is we do have global participation in these products. When we look at the European and APAC market, we've also seen strong uptake where they are more familiar with the product regionally, and this is something that is relatively reintroduced in the U.S. perspective. When we look at the partnerships, the tapping into the 130-plus retail firms that we work with, alongside the several dozen FCMs that we have on the institutional side, we're encouraged by the growth we've seen. With any new product, we're reintroducing an interesting new market structure for that financially settled Single Stock future. It does take time to work with our FCMs, to work with our vendors. As we head into the last quarter here of 2026, we're encouraged by what we see. Then we look forward to continuing to have it grow from here, but strong performance on this product out of the gate. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Tim. Julie, you want to add a little bit? Julie Winkler: Yeah. As Tim pointed out, we've had commercial momentum across over 50 countries globally, so the interest is definitely there. Just from a perspective of what's most interesting to clients, certainly on the institutional side, this is a capital and margin efficiency play. We have said this is a core tenet of our strategy across all of our asset classes. I think particularly for this product, the ability to cross-margin Single Stock futures against the robust CME equity index products, it's helping them unlock additional equity financing capacity. The buy side firms that we are speaking with are also actively embedding Single Stock futures into their QIS strategies and long-short equity models, so that's certainly positive. When we look on the retail side, we've got distribution to 25 of our top retail broker partners today. The value proposition for them is really it's an options alternative. We're looking at it, as are our clients and brokers, as a key differentiator across Leverage, static deltas, 0 option Greeks, it doesn't have any time decay. For us, the focus has very much been on building out that liquidity, Tim pointed out, we have some additional FCMs that are coming live here in Q4. We think we've got some great momentum going into the end of the year. Terry Duffy: Michael, on your question as it relates to predictions on Single Stock futures, you got to remember, we listed Single Stock futures going way back in 2000. The product did not get off the ground very well because of a whole host of reasons, I don't need to go through them right now. We've been working hard, Tim and his team have been working hard, Julie and her team have been working hard to make sure that we can have a successful Single Stock futures contract moving forward, because we do believe it's an important instrument for participants from the retail to the largest institutions to use. I don't think you can draw the conclusion that every single market has to have a prediction market associated with it. I think that you're getting a narrative right now where people believe that every market should have a prediction market associated with it. It doesn't make it right to do that. I'm not suggesting that we would not want to go down and have a prediction market on Single Stock futures. What I think is critically important is Single Stock futures get off the ground the way they've been doing, methodically working, looking at this as the long game. Then if we want to introduce another version of it with a prediction market, we will do so at that time once we get a better sample of the client base and how they are participating. Right now, this is really important for this product, which has been duly regulated. There's been a whole host of concerns going forward that we need to analyze and make a decision how we're going to do that going forward. This contract will go forward without predictions to start with, for sure. Michael Cyprys: Great. Thank you. Operator: The next question in the queue is from Craig Siegenthaler with Bank of America. Your line is open. Craig Siegenthaler: Thanks. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for taking my question. Our question is on the CFTC perpetual suit. How should we weigh the perpetuals lawsuit against your earlier comments that clients aren't asking for perpetuals? If the case is dismissed and perps are deemed futures in the U.S., would CME list its own perpetuals given its exclusivity in equity index futures? Terry Duffy: Yeah, Craig, thank you for the question. Our new General Counsel, John Marchese, is on the line. John, I'll let you go ahead and start, then I'll go from there. John Marchese: Yeah. In terms of the lawsuit itself, as you know, a motion to dismiss has been filed. We've opposed it. We are very confident in our position, and we are also going to brief the substance of the case and expect it to be fully before the judge in December. We are confident in our position, and we are awaiting the court's decision and are eager to get a decision. We think it will fall in our favor. I'll kick it back to you, Terry, on the sort of question strategically about what that means going forward. Terry Duffy: Craig, your question is if we're not being harmed, did you say something to that effect? Can you repeat that last part? Craig Siegenthaler: Yeah. If the case is dismissed or essentially if you guys lose it, and the perp is deemed as future in the U.S., I believe you have exclusivity with equity index. You could have a monopoly in that business. Would you then turn around and launch perpetuals in that category where there might be strong demand, and you could sort of own it? Terry Duffy: Yeah. Again, Craig, I think I'll go back to my earlier answer around prediction markets. We'll make that decision if and when the time comes. Whatever the court decides, we will abide by the court's decisions, and we will move forward. The question is, would we list perps or not? That question has yet to be asked and answered yet publicly. I will tell you that for now, the question of is it a perp or is it a future, is it a swap, all you have to do is Google the definition of a swap, and it's no different than a fixed versus floating rate, when you look at a swap today and when you look at a swap on perpetuals under Dodd-Frank, it suggests that a swap is designed as 2 people exchanging payments for that similar product. That is called the funding rate of the perp, and that is deemed a swap. We are fairly confident in our position on that. But again, we will cross that bridge when we get to it and not until. I would not make a decision one way or another if we would go forward with perps or not. But again, we feel very strongly about our case, as our general counsel said. Craig Siegenthaler: Thank you, Terry. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Craig. Operator: The next question is from Simon Clinch with Rothschild & Co Redburn, your line is open. Simon Clinch: Hi. Thanks for taking my question. I was wondering if we could just jump to the market data business. Obviously, it's been a couple of quarters now of 20% growth, if not more. I was wondering if you could just walk through again the kind of secular drivers here and how we should think about the normal kind of growth rate from this business going forward. Thanks. Julie Winkler: Yeah. Thanks for the question, Simon. It was another record quarter, 20%, $243 million. How I'll break that down for you is that we're really seeing an incredibly diverse mix of drivers across the entire ecosystem, and the growth is really broken down into 3 main buckets. One-third has been from our expanding professional subscriber base, and that's for our real-time market data. One-third coming from our retail and sim platforms, so that's our non-professional subscribers. The remainder in that last category is really driven by a combination of increased data feed demand, the term software, some of the pricing adjustments that we've made, and a few more policy changes. Really what we're seeing is that this demand for CME data has been increasing as clients need access to our prices for trading, for research, and product creation. That's really right in the midst of a really dynamic macroeconomic environment and characterized by a lot of sustained global volatility. I heard this firsthand when I attended the Global Market Data Conference in Copenhagen last week and was engaging with many of our market data partners and our clients. The last part, we had $4.7 million in audits this quarter and some catch-up payments for prior period use. That was a little below what we saw in Q2. I would just say, data continues to be a critical input, and it is a leading indicator for our markets. We're continuing to invest in this growing business. Also keep in mind that a lot of our market data business is driven outside the U.S., and so that demand over 50% comes from outside the U.S. Data business is almost always a first-to-customer asset for us and solution for them. We're continuing to listen to our customers, improve the client experience, but we don't share specific expectations about future growth. Simon Clinch: Great. Thanks so much. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Julie. Julie Winkler: Thank you. Operator: The next question is from Dan Welden with Wells Fargo. Your line is open. Dan Welden: Hi, good morning. I have a question about innovation speed. If I look at slide 8 from this morning, you've got 15 new announcements or launches. I go back a few quarters and that was more like single digits. Am I right to think that the cadence is increasing here? You've historically framed roughly 2% of your growth algorithm coming from new products. With the things like Compute, Single Stock futures, other things we've talked about today, does that 2% feel conservative at this moment? Thanks. Terry Duffy: Yeah, thank you, Dan. Appreciate it. Julie Winkler: Yeah, I'll start out and then can chat with Lynne. Certainly, it has been a busy year for product launches. You're correct in that. We've had 368 new products year to date. That is in addition to advances that we're making in our execution technology, where we're looking to introduce things like Treasury Link. These are things where we've proven we have the technology to be able to do this work. We also have the throughput from being able to quickly launch these new products on both the institutional as well as the retail side. That means a lot of partnership with our distribution networks as well as with our market data network to make that successful. I think it proves that we can move quickly as well as we're the only exchange that is offering 24 by 7 products. That doesn't just happen because we will it to be done. It takes a lot of work and technical agility on our part, and we've proven we can do that. Lynne, can I kick it up? Lynne Fitzpatrick: Yeah. Thanks, Julie. Dan, to your question, I don't know if there's a fundamental change in the outlook. We typically don't break down a percent of what's coming from new products going forward. I think we're in an environment now where there are many new risks that are coming forward that we are looking to address for our client base. I think the beauty of having the broad product set that we have is that when we do go to launch new products, it's typically in a space where those clients are already connected, so we're meeting that need and that additional risk for clients that are already connected to CME. So we'll continue to look at areas that new risks are evolving and look to meet that need with new products. It's hard to forecast what the years ahead will bring, but we certainly feel that we are in a good position to continue to grow and to be product as those needs arise. Terry Duffy: Dan, thank you for your question. I think I referred to you as Tom, so I apologize. I know it's Dan, so welcome. I know you're a newer analyst to CME, so thank you for your question. Appreciate it. Dan Welden: Thank you. Operator: The next question comes from Bill Katz with TD Cowen. Your line is open. Bill Katz: Okay, thank you. Good morning, everybody. Thank you for taking the question. Maybe to mix up the topics a little bit, I was wondering if you could talk a little about capital priorities from here. It is great to see the continued buyback, if you will. There has been a fair amount of industry consolidation, maybe more in the cash markets than the futures market. How are you thinking about priorities from here, maybe buyback versus anything on inorganic side? Thank you. Terry Duffy: Yeah. Thanks, Bill, and it is a great question. I will let Lynne Fitzpatrick start, and then I will chime in as well. Lynne Fitzpatrick: Yeah. So Bill, I would point out, obviously, we had the OSTTRA funds that we were looking to return through the repurchase program, and we have now completed the redeploy of that, so I want to make sure that was noted. What we like about our capital return policy is the flexibility. So whether that is our variable dividend structure or the repurchase, we have the ability to be flexible. So if opportunities were to come up on the inorganic side, we have that ability to flex. We also have a very low debt load. So we set up our capital structure in a way that gives us a lot of optionality. That being said, we have tended over time to be a lot more choosy when it comes to M&A. We are not active in that market at all times. What we tend to look for are things where we're bringing additional clients or additional products. We're driving additional capital efficiencies for our customer base. We tend to be a bit more focused within our lane when it comes to M&A. I think we've got a unique capital structure that gives us a lot of ability to pivot as needed. Terry Duffy: Just to add to what Lynne said, Bill, we have been very disciplined. Our debt load is probably the lowest in our sector for sure, and other companies of our size. That does put us in a very advantageous situation if we were to do something. Also, I think when you look at our mixture of return of capital going as a dividend-paying stock since 2002 through today and returning capital that way and now with the share repurchase, I just want to emphasize how important that is to different constituents of people who own CME and how they like to have that capital return to them, whether it's through buybacks, whether it's through the special or whether it's through the quarterly dividend. We are in a very strong position to do a lot of different things if we so choose. Again, I think what Lynne said is right. We just don't go out kicking and shopping for things that we don't think we need just to buy. We're very focused, and I think the reason why we stay focused is because when you look at that $100 billion of efficiencies that Lynne referenced a moment ago, that was just $40 billion not too long ago. These are things that we have been able to accomplish not only with the growth of our business, but some of the plug-and-play technology and other things that we have to enhance the volume of our business. That, to us, is how we grow the business. Bill Katz: Thank you. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Bill. Operator: The next question is from Ken Worthington with J.P. Morgan. Your line is open. Ken Worthington: Hi, good morning, everybody. I wanted to ask about the trends in open interest and how you see the relative importance of the data as you think about the volume outlook. As of September 30, 2026 versus September 30, 2025, equity open interest was up 0.2%, interest rate OI was up 1.2%, and energy OI was down 3.6%. It appeared to be a very strong environment for all 3 asset classes, and volumes were up low to mid-teens across the board in 3Q, as you highlighted, but it is velocity that is driving volume, not OI. The question is, why didn't OI really grow in the quarter in these products, and how big a factor is this in the outlook for volumes as we start to think about 2027? Terry Duffy: I am very much of the mindset, Ken, that we talk about open interest because it shows the people that are parking their positions on CME's books to manage risk. I referenced a number of 133 million open positions as of this morning. Our open interest has been sitting at very lofty levels for a long time, and the reason why I think that is more impressive today than it was as little as 5 years ago is because we didn't have some of these option products that expire in short-term basis like we do today. We didn't have weekly options expirations. We had quarterly options expirations, semi-quarterlies, and we had different types of products with different instruments where you would see the open interest build up significantly. So as impressive as the open interest is, and I will talk about it all the time, I think you have to look at it in the light that we do have many different expirations that we did not have just a couple of years ago. That is why you are seeing the numbers that you recited a moment ago. But again, I think that is a good problem to have to maintain levels in these single digits when you are having expirations on a weekly basis versus either a monthly or a quarterly basis. That is the big difference. Ken Worthington: Great. Thank you. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Ken. Operator: The next question is from Ben Budish with Barclays. Your line is open. Ben Budish: Hi. Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. I was wondering if you could spend a minute on Treasury Link. It looks like that's now live in testing. Could you maybe talk about any kind of early reads or feedback, and then maybe remind us about how you're thinking about the market opportunity, the potential size of the market that you're thinking about going after and the economic model? Is this simply collateral balances and BrokerTec revenues, or what else should we be thinking about there? Thank you. Terry Duffy: Yeah. Thanks, Ben. I'll let Mike go ahead and talk a little bit about that. It's been a little bonkers going on as it relates to some of the Treasury Link stuff, so I'll let Mike go ahead and touch on it. Mike Dennis: Yeah, no, thanks, Terry. It has been an interesting time in the rates landscape. Obviously, no shortage of things going on in the interest rate complex. But to get to your question, Ben, on Treasury Link, it's an industry-first Treasury functionality that will enable transparent, centralized spread trading between Treasury futures and BrokerTec cash Treasuries on CME Globex. This new offering really connects the 2 leading U.S. Treasury liquidity pools, bringing unique innovation, and it will enable guaranteed execution of anybody trading cash versus future spread transactions, and it'll eliminate legging risk in the process. Happy to say that over the weekend, Treasury Link is live now in our new release environment, and clients have been testing the functionality this week. And we've seen a lot of strong demand from both existing and prospective new participants who are interested in realizing execution efficiencies between cash and futures. And Treasury Link really just represents the next stage in an initiative to bring our cash and futures markets closer together. We're looking at, aside from Treasuries, futures versus cash, what are some other things that we can do to link products together? This is an evolving time in the Treasury landscape. We have a new Fed Chair who's committed to overhauling their communication strategy. We continue to see record debt levels. We see Treasury intervention in our markets, and we're fastly approaching the Treasury and repo clearing mandate. So it's just another example of how the CME Group continues to evolve and innovate, deliver efficiency to our clients alongside the $30 billion in margin savings across futures, options, swaps, and cash. So appreciate the question. More to come, but thanks, Ben. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Ben. Thanks, Mike. Operator: The next question is from Brian Bedell with Deutsche Bank. Your line is open. Brian Bedell: Great. Thanks. Good morning, folks. Thanks for taking my question. Terry, one for you, just to maybe come back to perpetuals and retail more broadly. You did talk about systemic risk. Just maybe if you can just update us on your view on, if equity index perpetual futures were to be approved in the U.S., how are you viewing that as a systemic risk potential? And I guess, do you see that potential approval ever coming to fruition, or do you think there'd be enough industry resistance? Then combined with that, you've seen obviously very good growth in the equity index micros, so maybe just talk about how you view retail being able to trade equity indices and single stocks, of course. Do you think there's literally enough tools for them to do that now without the need for perpetuals? Terry Duffy: Yeah. Brian, again, as I said earlier, I don't want to expand too much further on the argument of perpetuals if they're swaps or futures. Again, as I said earlier, I'll let the courts make that decision. As far as systemic risk that you're referring to, and I made that comment, I made that comment in reference to the leverage part of perpetuals that have been traded overseas. I made the comment when the amount of leverage was anywhere from 25, 50 to 250% leverage that are being traded on some of these overseas platforms, not here in the U.S. That's what I said is a systemic risk. I think that's what you're referring to. As far as Single Stock futures, what was your question on that one, Brian? Brian Bedell: Just as a, I guess, two-parter there. Just another tool, obviously, for retail to trade this, and that is good to see. But also there, I guess, do you have the same view on perpetuals for Single Stock futures? I guess, just since you mentioned leverage, if the leverage was contained dramatically, say, less than 10 times or, I am just making that number up, but something very low, would that change your view on the systemic riskiness of the product? Terry Duffy: Yeah, Brian, I do not ever give an opinion on changing my view until I actually see something in writing that suggests what it is going to be. A lot of people can make a lot of comments about what they think it is going to be, so why do not you just agree to it? I do not operate that way, I never have. I will wait until I see what they are proposing, if they propose something as it relates to leverage caps or things of that nature. But I have not seen anything, so it is really difficult for me to make a comment to you on that product. As it relates to the opportunity for retail on Single Stock futures, I said it earlier, and I truly believe it, I think this is a product that is going to be widely accepted from the retail participant to the institutional participants, and I think it is going to be something that is well overdue and needed. I think our client base is looking for it. When you have the last, say, 5 to 7 years with the Mag 7, Mag 9, whatever you want to call it, any single day, for people that have Single Stock futures on some of these products that trade a big portion of some of these indices, I think will be very attractive for both constituents of retail and institutional. Julie or Tim, you want to comment further? Julie Winkler: Yeah, I will just add, Brian, it is certainly we are highly focused on just evolving our product suite to be positioned to capture retail demand. We have delivered on the retail business the 10th consecutive quarter of double digit retail client acquisition growth. We welcomed well over 100,000 new retail traders into our markets in this past quarter, and that was a 40% increase of where we were a year ago. We are doing that through this product innovation that we have talked about on this call. We had a new record in our E-nano suite yesterday of over 121,000 contracts traded. We spoke to the Single Stock future success earlier being available 24 by 7. This is what our clients are demanding and working closely with our retail partner to continue to ramp those education and those marketing efforts through the remainder of the year. We believe this growth is going to be achieved by upholding our rigorous risk management frameworks and that structural integrity that we've talked about on this call, and that is what's helping to define and really grow our retail business here. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Jill. Brian, hopefully that addresses some of your questions. I don't duck any questions, so hopefully that gave you some- Brian Bedell: Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Great color. Thank you very much. Yep. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Brian. Appreciate your question. Operator: The next question is from Ashish Sabadra with RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open. Will Qi: Hey, good morning, guys. This is Will Qi on for Ashish Sabadra. Appreciate you guys squeezing us in. Maybe a quick question on the newly launched NHL FutureSports indices and their corresponding futures instruments. Seems to be kind of an interesting position to step away from kind of the sports betting that you guys don't want to get involved in. It's in kind of aligned with the IOSCO framework for benchmarks. With the early days, about a month in, what's the kind of early traction you've seen with that product? Is it coming from institutional demand? Is there any retail demand? What's the kind of, I guess, runway you expect for that? Terry Duffy: That's a good question, Will. Thank you. It is a new product, so we don't want to judge it too early in the season. I'll let Tim go ahead and make a comment as it relates to it. He oversees those businesses. Tim McCourt: Thanks, Terry, and thanks, Will, for the question. I think what's interesting about this opportunity and partnering with FutureSports and trying to bring risk management and access to National sports industry and economy in the U.S. is that this is different in the sense this is based on the statistical performance of the teams that, as you pointed out, are indexed in accordance with IOSCO principles and guidelines. When we look at building new risk management capabilities, one of the first things to do is work with the market to ascribe that transparent, trusted, real-time price of what that risk is valued at any given moment, and then build the product ecosystem around it. That's why we're excited about the opportunity. When we look at how this can be used, it is very attractive on the institutional-grade front when you think about the if you read some of the reports, the $650 billion U.S. sports value per year, that community largely has an unmet need to manage those associated risks, to hedge that related to the operation of venues, to the performance of that team. So it's really interesting to be able to introduce these products. But like a lot of products, it's really about bringing that diversified participant mix to it. So we are also working on the individual-sized contracts and working with our retail partners to make sure that those smaller-sized individuals can access these markets and also hedge their needs. So we're excited about the opportunity. It's early days, just a few weeks in, but we're excited and look forward to continuing to work with FutureSports to bring risk management to the sports industry here in the U.S. Terry Duffy: William, thank you for the question. Tim, thanks for the response. Operator: The next question is from Michael Cyprys with Morgan Stanley. Your line is open. Michael Cyprys: Thanks for taking the follow-up. I just wanted to ask about the $100 billion of margin efficiencies that you mentioned that seems to be up quite a bit from a year or even 2 years ago. I was hoping you could elaborate on the drivers of that expansion over the past year, how much of that relates to simply more activity on the platform versus the impact of newer initiatives like the FICC cross margining. As you look out over the next couple of years, what new or initiatives do you think could be most meaningful to take that higher at, say, flat volumes? Thank you. Terry Duffy: To get higher, I like that one, Mike. Go ahead, Lynne. Lynne Fitzpatrick: Yeah. So it's really broad-based, Mike, which is, which is what's important. So you're going to have the increased level of activity, the increased level of interest rate OI. You're seeing growth across all the different asset classes. You did mention some of the specific extensions to cross margining, which, you know, Mike can touch on. We're definitely seeing good success on the FICC cross margining as well as the swap offsets in rates. But we're seeing growth in the equities complex, we're seeing growth in the energy offsets as well as the rates component, so it's really across the base. But Mike, why don't you comment on the specific rates? Mike Dennis: Yeah, it's appreciated, Lynne, and Michael, thanks for the question. I'm going to touch a little bit on portfolio margining as it relates to our swap business, and then I'll also talk about some growth trends that we're seeing in our CME FICC Cross Margin program, now that FCM partners are taking advantage of the savings with cascading that down to client accounts. So if you look at portfolio margining in our swaps business, Q3 resulted in a new record. We saw new daily savings of $14 billion occurring on September 30. That was a record. I would say, if we look at savings in September, that averaged $13.2 billion, and that was up 58% versus September of 2025. New clients joining our portfolio margining program have really contributed to that savings. Just to put that into perspective, in 2024, that swap savings number was around $7.2 billion, $7.3 billion per day. It is closer to $14 billion, so we have seen a lot of growth there. If we look at our CME FICC cross margining program, we have about 24 clearing members currently registered for the program, and we expect there to be a ramp-up period as FCMs complete operational readiness. Firms are very engaged. They are meeting with us. Many of them are targeting Q4 to be fully up and running for that cross margining program prior to the Treasury and repo clearing mandate, but we are seeing strong growth there. September average daily savings in the program was $2.3 billion a day, and we saw a record day in Q3 of $2.7 billion. So that is kind of come off that one and a half number that we talked about in the beginning of the year. Just want to highlight where we have seen growth, particularly in the rates environment. Terry Duffy: Let me just touch for a second because I think we talk a lot about the rates, but I think the equities is such a huge part of that $100 billion. Tim, maybe you can give a little color on that as well. Tim McCourt: Thanks, Terry, and Michael, thanks for the question. I think when we look at the equity savings almost coming in just under $47 billion for Q3, that is up substantially versus the levels put up in prior quarters and in 2025. That comes from 2 main things. One is the base offset that we have in our base F&O at CME Group, which is just under $42 billion. Then we also have the CME OCC cross margin agreement, which delivered a little over $5 billion this quarter. I think what's interesting, and Michael, to your question, is when we look at in the equity complex where some of those savings are coming from, if we look at all of 2026, about 60% of the increase is coming from new positions established at CME Group and about 40% from rising index levels or rising asset levels and margin being posted at CME. It's really encouraging to see that coming from that organic new activity and risk being moved to CME Group to capture and take advantage of these capital efficiencies. To give a little bit more color on that, one prime example of how the clients in the marketplace is taking advantage is we look at the growth of our OTC swap alternative products at CME Group that average daily open interest in Q3 of products like our dividend futures, dividend options, and our adjusted interest rate total return futures, that OI grew 30% year-over-year to 2.6 million contracts worth about just under $500 billion of additional open interest value or contract value in open interest being moved to CME. This is a continuation of a long-standing trend at CME Group of futurizing the swap market and bringing new flow and new participants to the equity complex at CME Group to take advantage of these capital efficiencies. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Tim. Mike, appreciate the question. Michael Cyprys: Great. Thank you. Operator: The last question in the queue is from Simon Clinch with Rothschild & Co Redburn, your line is open. Simon Clinch: Hi. Thanks for squeezing me in for a follow-up again. Terry, a bit of a broader question here. As we think about the retail platforms and perhaps some FCMs eventually moving to explore launching products in their own right, be it prediction markets, perps or even other options perhaps, as that happens, how do you expect the relationship between CME and those partners develop where the economic incentive becomes more prevalent for them to steer volume towards their in-house products where they earn more of the economics? Just kind of curious as to your view on that. Thanks. Terry Duffy: Yeah. Thanks, Simon, for the question. I would be speculating at best, but when we just got done speaking about $100 billion plus of efficiencies, that is really difficult to replicate with a lot of the things that we have done. Retail traditionally does not carry much open interest. As you know, we have said this historically, 94% of CME's business is institutionally driven. Again, I think when you are looking at what you are suggesting as platforms listing their own products, is that more attractive to coming to CME? You need to have an ecosystem of liquidity from the biggest institutions in the world that are at CME. We have cited that through our open interest that retail needs to participate with. Retail trading with just retail and props is not a long-term solution for any particular product. So you need to have all the different participants coming in. I think our value proposition is strong, and those same participants that you are referring to are very large clients of CME, and I think they benefit immensely by being here at CME, participating in those liquidity pools, generating those efficiencies, and for themselves, benefiting their own bottom line. Again, I think what we are doing is a value-added proposition. Again, very difficult to replicate, and it is moves that we have made historically. But again, I think you cannot stress enough the ecosystem, how important it is. Just to think that retail trading against retail with a prop is a long-term proposition for a successful market, I have not seen one in my 46 years in the business. Simon Clinch: That's great. Thank you very much. Terry Duffy: Thanks, Simon. Appreciate it. Operator: Showing no further questions, I will now turn the call back over to management for closing remarks. Terry Duffy: Thank you very much. We appreciate everyone participating in the call. We are very proud of our record quarter today. It's a very dangerous world out there. We see risk management continuing to be a big part of it. I hope everyone stays safe and healthy, and thank you very much for participating in today's call. Operator: This concludes today's call. Thank you for your participation. You may disconnect at this time. 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This article is a transcript of this conference call produced for The Motley Fool. While we strive for our Foolish Best, there may be errors, omissions, or inaccuracies in this transcript. As with all our articles, The Motley Fool does not assume any responsibility for your use of this content, and we strongly encourage you to do your own research, including listening to the call yourself and reading the company's SEC filings. Please see our Terms and Conditions for additional details, including our Obligatory Capitalized Disclaimers of Liability. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends CME Group. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. CME (CME) Q3 2026 Earnings Call Transcript was originally published by The Motley Fool

Our analysts just identified a stock with the potential to be the next Nvidia. Tell us how you invest and we'll show you why it's our #1 pick. Tap here. - Achieved record Q3 average daily volume of 29.4 million contracts, a 16% increase driven by double-digit growth across all six asset classes. - Performance was bolstered by shifting central bank policies and geopolitical uncertainty, leading global participants to seek CME's liquid benchmark products. - International business reached a record 9 million average daily volume, up 22%, led by significant growth in energy and agricultural products in EMEA and APAC. - Management emphasized that record open interest of 133 million contracts reflects the underlying health of the business and its role as a primary risk management destination. - Strategic focus remains on capital efficiency, delivering a record $100 billion in daily margin savings to customers through cross-margining and portfolio offsets. - Technology innovation is centered on the Google Cloud migration, with the Dallas disaster recovery facility showing performance parity with on-premises infrastructure. - Management reiterated a commitment to market integrity, stating they will not sacrifice core financial safeguards or client protections for the sake of rapid innovation. - On track for the December 7 launch of CME Securities Clearing to address the upcoming SEC Treasury clearing mandate. - Cloud migration of primary markets is expected to begin in late 2027, following positive testing of the Dallas disaster recovery infrastructure. - Q4 volume is currently surpassing last year's record by 17%, positioning the company for another record-breaking fiscal year. - Management is moving away from annual pricing freezes toward more frequent, value-based adjustments spread throughout the year. - Future 24/7 market expansion is dependent on the evolution of the U.S. banking infrastructure to support weekend prefunding and liquidity. - Withdrew the 10-barrel WTI 24/7 filing following commercial participant concerns regarding staffing costs and operational readiness. - Market data revenue reached an all-time quarterly record of $243 million, marking the 34th consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth. - Completed the redeployment of OSTTRA funds through a $524 million share repurchase program, contributing to a total of nearly $1 billion returned to shareholders in Q3. - Management expressed concern regarding U.S. participants trading on unregulated overseas VPNs and called for better policing of U.S. law adherence. - The CFTC extended the comment period until November 9; CME is waiting for government approval before proceeding with the launch. - Management reported strong demand from neocloud players, data center operators, and banks seeking to hedge unhedgable AI infrastructure risks. One stock. Nvidia-level potential. 30M+ investors trust Moby to find it first. Get the pick. Tap here. - Single Stock futures saw 350,000 contracts since launch, serving as a capital-efficient alternative to options for retail and institutional clients. - Management is not currently pursuing prediction markets for single stocks, preferring to methodically build the core futures product first. - CME expects to benefit from higher escalation rates starting in 2027, five years earlier than the previous agreement's expiration. - Management characterized the deal as a "winning proposal" for CME shareholders due to the improved economic terms in the JV. - CME remains confident that perpetuals are legally classified as swaps under Dodd-Frank due to the exchange of payments via funding rates. - Terry Duffy warned that high leverage (up to 250%) on overseas perpetual platforms creates systemic risk that CME will not replicate. - Growth in the equity complex was driven by a mix of new positions (60%) and rising asset levels (40%). - FICC cross-margining savings reached a single-day record of $2.7 billion in Q3, while September average daily savings were $2.3 billion., with more clearing members expected to ramp up ahead of the Treasury mandate.

- Interested in CME Group Inc.? Here are five stocks we like better. - CME Group reported record third-quarter results: Average daily volume rose 16% year over year to 29.4 million contracts, while revenue increased 13% to $1.7 billion and adjusted diluted EPS climbed 13% to $3.02. - International activity and open interest reached record levels. International average daily volume grew 22% to 9 million contracts, and quarter-end open interest reached 128 million contracts, reflecting strong demand for risk-management products. - CME is expanding its product and technology offerings, including Single Stock futures, 24/7 trading initiatives, CME Securities Clearing and proposed Compute futures. Pricing changes are expected to lift annualized clearing and transaction fees by 0.5% to 1%. - Record French Debt Could Create Opportunities for U.S. Market Operators CME Group (NASDAQ:CME) reported record third-quarter activity and financial results, citing broad-based demand for risk-management products amid shifting central-bank policies, geopolitical uncertainty and market volatility. Chairman and CEO Terry Duffy said average daily volume reached 29.4 million contracts in the third quarter, the company's highest third-quarter level on record and a 16% increase from a year earlier. Volume grew by double digits across all six asset classes, with financial and commodity product volumes each rising 16%. → The AI Sell-Off Continues—These 3 Stocks Keep Raising Guidance Anyway - Not Just Banks: 3 Trading Stocks to Watch After the Fed Rate Hike "Global participants continue to turn to CME Group in record numbers," Duffy said. President and CFO Lynne Fitzpatrick said third-quarter revenue rose 13% year over year to $1.7 billion, representing a record for third-quarter revenue. Market data revenue reached an all-time quarterly high of $243 million, up 20% from the prior-year period and marking the company's 34th consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth in that business. → Tesla's Roadster Reveal Hints at 2 Much Bigger Moves - Volatility Is Back and These 3 Market Tollbooths Are Best Positioned to Profit Adjusted expenses totaled $532 million, including $428 million excluding license fees. Fitzpatrick said higher license fees reflected strong volume growth, particularly in the equity complex, where volume increased 23%. Adjusted operating income rose 15% to $1.2 billion, producing a 69.4% adjusted operating margin. Adjusted net income was $1.1 billion, while adjusted diluted earnings per share increased 13% to $3.02. CME Group's adjusted net income margin was 62.4%. → Luxury's Middle Market Is Cracking—These 3 Stocks Could Win The company returned nearly $1 billion to shareholders during the quarter through $465 million in regular quarterly dividends and $524 million in share repurchases. Fitzpatrick said revenue has increased 9% and adjusted earnings per share has risen 11% through the first nine months of the year. Entering the fourth quarter, CME said volume was running 17% above the prior year's record fourth-quarter pace and was 12% ahead of the prior year on a year-to-date basis. Quarter-end open interest reached 128 million contracts and stood above 133 million contracts at the time of the call, according to Duffy. He said that represented the company's highest September-ending open interest on record. CME also recorded a high number of large open-interest holders in its interest-rate and foreign-exchange complexes during September. The company said it provided customers with average daily margin savings of more than $100 billion during the third quarter. Management attributed the figure to broad-based activity and cross-margining programs across asset classes. In equities, Senior Managing Director Tim McCourt said margin savings totaled nearly $47 billion in the third quarter, including nearly $42 billion from CME's core futures-and-options offsets and more than $5 billion from its cross-margin arrangement with the Options Clearing Corp. In fixed income, Senior Managing Director Mike Dennis said daily portfolio-margining savings in swaps reached a record $14 billion on Sept. 30. Average September savings were $13.2 billion, up 58% from a year earlier. CME-FICC cross-margining generated average daily savings of $2.3 billion in September, with a quarterly record of $2.7 billion on one day. International average daily volume rose 22% to a record 9 million contracts. EMEA volume increased 20% to 6.5 million contracts per day, while APAC volume gained 28% to 2.1 million contracts per day. International growth was led by energy products, up 40%, agricultural products, up 28%, and equity index products, up 24%. CME introduced several products during the quarter, including Single Stock futures and E-nano Equity Index futures. It also expanded 24/7 trading to its 1-Ounce Gold and 100-Ounce Silver contracts, following the earlier launch of around-the-clock cryptocurrency products. McCourt said Single Stock futures had traded more than 350,000 contracts and represented approximately $3.5 billion in notional value since launch. The products cover 55 large U.S. companies in 100-share contracts, with 10-share versions available for 22 of those names. Chief Commercial Officer Julie Winkler said the products have gained participation across more than 50 countries and are distributed through 25 of CME's top retail broker partners. Duffy said CME withdrew its filing for a 24/7, 10-barrel WTI crude-oil contract after commercial participants raised concerns about staffing another desk to support continuous trading. While he said he expects markets ultimately to move toward 24/7 availability, he added that broader adoption of around-the-clock trading in major products will require banking, liquidity and back-office infrastructure capable of supporting it. The company remains on track to launch CME Securities Clearing on Dec. 7 ahead of the SEC's Treasury clearing mandate. It also said Treasury Link, a system intended to enable centralized spread trading between Treasury futures and BrokerTec cash Treasuries on CME Globex, is live in its new-release environment for client testing. On technology, Duffy said CME's Dallas disaster-recovery facility, developed as part of its Google Cloud migration, opened for client testing in June. He said performance has shown latency and consistency equal to or better than the company's on-premises offering. CME expects to begin migrating its primary Chicago market region to the cloud in late 2027 and determined that relocating livestock markets to Dallas is no longer necessary in the interim. Management said it is awaiting regulatory review of proposed Compute futures after the Commodity Futures Trading Commission extended its comment period by 45 days. Duffy said the company believes the product would help market participants manage risks associated with data centers, artificial intelligence infrastructure, hyperscalers and related investments. Derek Sammann, senior managing director and global head of commodities markets, said CME has worked on the product for nearly two years and has seen interest from neocloud companies, data-center operators, banks, funds, proprietary trading firms and chip providers. He said the proposed benchmark from Silicon Data is IOSCO compliant and supported by data across multiple platforms and transaction types. Fitzpatrick said pricing changes implemented Oct. 1 are expected to contribute an annualized 0.5% to 1% increase in clearing and transaction fees. The adjustments affect cryptocurrency products, grains, certain interest-rate tiers and micro equity products. CME has moved away from an annual pricing freeze and plans to make changes throughout the year as market conditions and value creation warrant, she said. Regarding capital priorities, Fitzpatrick said CME had completed the repurchase deployment of proceeds from the OSTTRA transaction. She said the company's dividend structure, repurchase capacity and low debt load provide flexibility for potential acquisitions, though CME remains selective and focuses on opportunities that add customers, products or capital efficiencies. CME Group Inc operates global derivatives marketplaces that provide trading, clearing and settlement services for futures and options contracts. Its products cover major asset classes, including interest rates, equity indexes, foreign currencies, agricultural commodities, energy and metals. The company also provides market data, benchmark information and related services used by financial institutions, corporations, producers, investors and other market participants. CME Group's exchange portfolio includes CME, the Chicago Board of Trade, the New York Mercantile Exchange and COMEX. This instant news alert was generated by narrative science technology and financial data from MarketBeat in order to provide readers with the fastest reporting and unbiased coverage. Please send any questions or comments about this story to [email protected]. The article "CME Group Q3 Earnings Call Highlights" was originally published by MarketBeat. View MarketBeat's top stocks for October 2026.

CME Group (CME) reported $1.74 billion in revenue for the quarter ended September 2026, representing a year-over-year increase of 13%. EPS of $3.02 for the same period compares to $2.68 a year ago. The reported revenue compares to the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.71 billion, representing a surprise of +1.43%. The company delivered an EPS surprise of +1.34%, with the consensus EPS estimate being $2.98. While investors scrutinize revenue and earnings changes year-over-year and how they compare with Wall Street expectations to determine their next move, some key metrics always offer a more accurate picture of a company's financial health. Since these metrics play a crucial role in driving the top- and bottom-line numbers, comparing them with the year-ago numbers and what analysts estimated about them helps investors better project a stock's price performance. Here is how CME performed in the just reported quarter in terms of the metrics most widely monitored and projected by Wall Street analysts: - Average daily volume: 29.45 million versus the four-analyst average estimate of 29.12 million. - Average rate per contract- Interest rates: $0.49 versus the four-analyst average estimate of $0.48. - Average rate per contract- Equity indexes: $0.61 versus $0.61 estimated by four analysts on average. - Average rate per contract- Foreign exchange: $0.85 compared to the $0.82 average estimate based on four analysts. - Average rate per contract- Energy: $1.15 versus $1.14 estimated by four analysts on average. - Average rate per contract- Agricultural commodities: $1.38 versus $1.43 estimated by four analysts on average. - Average daily volume- Metals: 935 thousand versus 948.26 thousand estimated by four analysts on average. - Average rate per contract: $0.68 compared to the $0.68 average estimate based on four analysts. - Average daily volume- Interest rates: 15.12 million compared to the 14.83 million average estimate based on four analysts. - Revenues- Other: $116.1 million compared to the $116.04 million average estimate based on four analysts. The reported number represents a change of +8.3% year over year. - Revenues- Market data and information services: $243.1 million compared to the $236.2 million average estimate based on four analysts. The reported number represents a change of +20.1% year over year. - Revenues- Clearing and transaction fees: $1.38 billion versus the four-analyst average estimate of $1.36 billion. The reported number represents a year-over-year change of +12.2%. View all Key Company Metrics for CME here>>> Shares of CME have returned +10.5% over the past month versus the Zacks S&P 500 composite's +1% change. The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy), indicating that it could outperform the broader market in the near term. Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report CME Group Inc. (CME) : Free Stock Analysis Report This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com). Zacks Investment Research

CME Group Inc. CME reported third-quarter 2026 adjusted earnings per share of $3.02, which beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 1.3%. The bottom line increased 12.7% year over year.  Quarterly results reflected higher clearing and transaction fees, market data and information services, as well as higher trading volumes. CME Group Inc. price-consensus-eps-surprise-chart | CME Group Inc. Quote CME Group's revenues of $1.73 billion increased 13% year over year. The year-over-year increase was primarily due to higher clearing and transaction fees, market data and information services, and other factors. The top line beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 1.2%. Total expenses rose 5.5% year over year to $595.9 million, attributable to higher technology, depreciation and amortization, licensing and other fee agreements, and other expenses. Operating income increased 17.3% from the prior-year quarter to $1.14 billion. Average daily volume (ADV) was a record 29.4 million contracts, up 16.3% year over year. ADV increased across Interest rates, Equity indexes, Foreign exchange, Energy, Agricultural commodities, and Metals product lines. The total average rate per contract was 67.9 cents. As of Sept. 30, 2026, CME Group had $23.3 billion of cash and marketable securities, down 48.7% from the 2025-end level. As of Sept. 30, 2026, long-term debt was $3.4 billion, up 0.1% from 2025-end. As of Sept. 30, 2026, CME had shareholders' equity worth $26.5 billion, down 7.5% from the end of 2025. CME Group paid out $1 billion in dividends during the third quarter of 2026, with $465 million in regular quarterly dividends and $524 million in share repurchases. CME Group currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here. Intercontinental Exchange Inc. ICE is set to report third-quarter 2026 results on Oct. 29, before market open. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter earnings per share is pegged at $1.97, suggesting an increase of 15.2% from the year-ago quarter's reported figure. ICE's earnings beat estimates in each of the last four quarters. Cboe Global Markets, Inc. CBOE is set to report third-quarter 2026 results on Oct. 30, before market open. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter earnings per share is pegged at $3.40, suggesting an increase of 27.3% from the year-ago quarter's reported figure. CBOE's earnings beat estimates in each of the last four quarters. Nasdaq, Inc. NDAQ is set to report third-quarter 2026 results on Oct. 22, before market open. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for third-quarter earnings per share is pegged at $1.02, suggesting an increase of 15.9% from the year-ago quarter's reported figure. NDAQ's earnings beat estimates in each of the last four quarters. Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report CME Group Inc. (CME) : Free Stock Analysis Report Intercontinental Exchange Inc. (ICE) : Free Stock Analysis Report Nasdaq, Inc. (NDAQ) : Free Stock Analysis Report Cboe Global Markets, Inc. (CBOE) : Free Stock Analysis Report This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com). Zacks Investment Research