NYSE doesn't rule out options acquisitions

By Ros Krasny

NEW YORK (Reuters) - NYSE Euronext (NYX.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) can boost its share of the U.S. equity options market with existing products, but would not rule out an acquisition, chief executive John Thain said on Tuesday.

"We can grow our market share from the current level organically. We don't need to do a deal. Although we could do a deal," Thain said at the Reuters Exchanges and Trading Summit in New York.

NYSE picked up the former Pacific Exchange through its purchase of Archipelago Holdings in 2006. NYSE has reconfigured the technology for the options trading system, Thain said.

From January through April, NYSE had an 11.2 percent market share in U.S. options, up from 9.7 percent for all of 2006. During the first four months of 2007, it ranked fourth among six exchanges, according to the Options Clearing Corp.

Among its competitors NYSE is the lone exchange to trade no index options. By contrast, the Chicago Board Options Exchange, the largest U.S. options mart, generates over 40 percent of its trading volume through index and exchange traded fund options.

Stock exchanges are thought to be eager to boost their presence in options and futures, where volumes have been growing more rapidly.

The No. 2 U.S. options mart, International Securities Exchange Inc. ISE.N said last week it is being bought by Germany's Deutsche Boerse (DB1Gn.DE: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) for $2.8 billion.

Thain also said the NYSE, now that it has absorbed the pan-European Euronext exchange, can also expand its futures business. "Our strategy is to be one of the large, multiproduct global exchanges."  Continued...