Monday, April 21, 2008

Carbon market exchanges ripe for consolidation (A $2 Trillion Market !?!)

A couple weeks ago we used the term "further cartelization".
Très
déclassé.
Consolidation is so much more up-market.
From Reuters via the Globe and Mail:

A cut-throat battle is emerging to dominate trade in permits to emit greenhouse gases, which could grow to rival the $3-trillion oil trade, with dominant exchanges eventually expected in Europe, the U.S. and Asia.

Emissions exchanges are the hubs of a growing, $60-billion carbon market, where companies buy and sell permits to emit harmful greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide, and are expected to consolidate as a global market emerges, analysts say.

London will remain the world's carbon trading capital in 2012, when the Kyoto Protocol's first commitment period ends, according to a Reuters survey of emissions traders and analysts.

There are currently more than 10 exchanges worldwide trading carbon emissions, and with several more expected to launch futures or spot contracts this year, traders say the market is fragmented and expect consolidation by 2012.

“Inevitably some will fall by the wayside and others will get taken out,” said Jim Benson, an emissions trader at BP. “I think (by 2012) there is likely to be one dominant exchange in the U.S. and one in Europe.”

So which exchanges will dominate?...MORE