Heavy trade on Winnipeg Commodity Exchange Inc. last Friday, shattered the previous all-time daily volume record. There were 44,503 futures contracts traded on March 31, which is 11,122 contracts more than the previous record of 33,381 contracts set on Jan. 31, 2006.

The day’s trade also resulted in six other volume records being set.

May 2006 and July 2006 canola futures contracts set daily volume records for those contract months at 15,932 and 12,132 contracts respectively. The total daily volume for all canola futures contracts set a record at 29,151 contracts.

Trade activity in western barley futures posted daily volume records in the May and July futures contract months. Volume of trade in the May 2006 western barley futures contract was 7,262 and July 2006 western barley futures contract volume was 7,574. The total daily volume for all western barley futures contracts reached a new record at 15,079 contracts.

Complementing the all-time daily volume records is a solid level of open interest. At the end of March 2006 open interest was up 42.8% from a year ago at 126,215 contracts representing 112,442 futures contracts and 13,773 options contracts. The open interest level for futures contracts is the second highest on record.

WCE is Canada’s only agricultural futures and options exchange and North America’s first fully electronic commodity exchange.