The Chicago Board Options Exchange announced that a seat was bought last week for a record price of US$1.4 million.

This is a new record seat price surpassed the previous high of US$1,375,000, which was set on April 25. This most recent seat sale was the 50th of the year and the 37th seat that was sold for at least US$1 million during 2006. The high seat sale for 2005 was US$875,000.

Seats are bought and sold via CBOE’s Membership Department using an auction method in which bids and offers are submitted to the exchange on an “as-desired: basis. When a bid matches an offer, a sale is made.