The Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) yesterday unveiled details of a plan to challenge the grip of the New York Mercantile Exchange (Nymex) on full-sized gold and silver futures by saying that it would offer them on an electronic basis on October 6.

The plan, reported first by the Financial Times in May, is another sign that US derivatives exchanges are starting to compete against each other in the same products amid rapid developments in electronic trading and as global exchange competition for fund flows intensifies.