London Metal Exchange
futures exchange in London, England
The London Metal Exchange (LME) is a futures and forwards exchange in London, United Kingdom with the world's largest market in standardised forward contracts, futures contracts and options on base metals. The exchange also offers contracts on ferrous metals and precious metals. The company also allows for cash trading. It offers hedging, worldwide reference pricing, and the option of physical delivery to settle contracts.
Overview
Ring trading
Trading times are 11:40 to 17:00.
The LME is the last exchange in Europe where open-outcry trading takes place. The ring was temporarily closed in March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In January 2021, LME proposed closing the ring, Europe's last open-outcry trading floor, and moving permanently to an electronic system. However, the ring reopened in September of the same year after resistance from members.
In addition to the 9 companies that have exclusive rights to trade in the ring, around 100 companies are involved in the LME in total.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q952937. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2020 and 2021.
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This entry incorporates text from “London Metal Exchange” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.