CME, the world’s largest futures exchange, will halve its electronic trading times in a move that could lessen the threat from a planned new exchange backed by some of the world’s largest derivatives dealers.

The CME Group, formed by last year’s merger of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the Chicago Board of Trade, will cut the time it takes for a futures transaction to trade on its Globex platform from 31 milliseconds to 16.5 milliseconds, through an upgrade to its electronic trading system.