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Performance Bonds and Guaranty Fund Contributions | 12 Months Ended
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Dec. 31, 2024
Performance Bonds and Guaranty Fund Contributions [Abstract] |
Performance Bonds and Guaranty Fund Contributions | PERFORMANCE BONDS AND GUARANTY FUND CONTRIBUTIONS The clearing house clears and guarantees the settlement of contracts traded in the futures and options and interest rate swap markets. In its guarantor role, the clearing house has precisely equal and offsetting claims to and from clearing firms on opposite sides of each contract, standing as an intermediary on every contract cleared. In the U.S., clearing firm funds are held according to Commodity and Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) regulatory account segregation standards. To the extent that funds are not otherwise available to satisfy an obligation under the applicable contract, the clearing house bears counterparty credit risk in the event that future market movements create conditions that could lead to clearing firms failing to meet their obligations to the clearing house. The clearing house reduces the exposure through risk management programs that include initial and ongoing financial standards for designation as a clearing firm, performance bond requirements, daily mark-to-market, mandatory guaranty fund contributions and intra-day monitoring. Each clearing firm is required to deposit and maintain balances in the form of cash, U.S. government securities, certain foreign government securities, bank letters of credit or other approved collateral to satisfy performance bond and guaranty fund requirements. All non-cash deposits and certain cash deposits with foreign currency exposure are marked-to-market and haircut on a daily basis. Securities deposited by the clearing firms are not reflected on the consolidated financial statements and the clearing house does not earn any interest on these deposits. These balances may fluctuate significantly over time due to investment choices available to clearing firms and changes in the amount of contributions required. Cash performance bonds and guaranty fund contributions are included as restricted cash and restricted cash equivalents on the consolidated statements of cash flows. The clearing house marks-to-market open positions at least once a day (twice a day for futures and options contracts), and requires payment from clearing firms whose positions have lost value and makes payments to clearing firms whose positions have gained value. The clearing house has the capability to mark-to-market more frequently as market conditions warrant. Under the extremely unlikely scenario of simultaneous default by every clearing firm who has open positions with unrealized losses, the maximum exposure at the time of default related to positions other than interest rate swap contracts would be one half day of changes in fair value of all open positions, before considering the clearing house's ability to access defaulting clearing firms' collateral deposits. For cleared interest rate swap contracts, the maximum exposure at the time of default related to the clearing house's guarantee would be one full day of changes in fair value of all open positions, before considering the clearing house's ability to access defaulting clearing firms' collateral. During 2024, the clearing house transferred an average of approximately $5.7 billion a day through the clearing system for settlement from clearing firms whose positions had lost value to clearing firms whose positions had gained value. The clearing house reduces its exposure through maintenance performance bond requirements and guaranty fund contributions. For futures and options products, the clearing firms' collateral requirements are sized to cover at least one day of anticipated price movements. For cleared swap products, the clearing firms' collateral requirements are sized to cover at least five days of anticipated price movements. Management has assessed the fair value of the company's settlement guarantee liability by taking the following factors into consideration: the design and operations of the clearing risk management process, the financial safeguard packages in place, historical evidence of default by a clearing member and the estimated probability of potential payouts by the clearing house. Based on the assessment performed, management estimates the guarantee liability to be nominal and therefore has not recorded any liability at December 31, 2024. CME has been designated as a systemically important financial market utility by the Financial Stability Oversight Council and is authorized to maintain cash accounts at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. At December 31, 2024 and 2023, the clearing house maintained $87.4 billion and $79.3 billion, respectively, within the cash accounts at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. The cash deposited at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago is included within performance bonds and guaranty fund contributions on the consolidated balance sheets. In 2024 and 2023, earnings from cash performance bond and guaranty fund contributions were $3,943.8 million and $5,073.9 million, respectively. In 2024 and 2023, expense related to the distribution of interest earned on collateral reinvestments were $3,669.4 million a nd $4,717.5 million, respectively. The earnings from cash performance bonds and guaranty fund contributions are included in investment income and the expense related to the distribution of interest earned is included in other non-operating income (expense) on the consolidated statements of income. CME and The Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) have a perpetual cross-margin arrangement, whereby a clearing firm may maintain a cross-margin account in which a clearing firm's positions in certain equity index futures and options are combined with certain positions cleared by OCC for purposes of calculating performance bond requirements. The performance bond deposits are held jointly by CME and OCC. Cross-margin cash, securities and letters of credit jointly held with OCC under the cross-margin agreement are reflected at 50% of the total, or CME's proportionate share per that agreement. If a participating firm defaults, the gain or loss on the liquidation of the firm's open position and the proceeds from the liquidation of the cross- margin account would be allocated equally between CME and OCC. In the event of a remaining loss, CME would first apply assets of the defaulting clearing firm to satisfy its payment obligation. These assets include the defaulting firm's guaranty fund contributions, performance bonds and any other available assets, such as assets required for clearing membership and any associated trading rights. Thereafter, if the payment default remains unsatisfied, the clearing house would use its corporate contributions designated for the respective financial safeguard package. The clearing house would then use guaranty fund contributions of other clearing firms within the respective financial safeguard package and funds collected through an assessment against solvent clearing firms within the respective financial safeguard package to satisfy the deficit. In addition, CME has a cross-margin arrangement with Fixed Income Clearing Corporation (FICC) whereby certain of the clearing firms' offsetting positions with CME and FICC are subject to reduced performance bond requirements. Clearing firms maintain separate performance bond deposits with each clearing house, but based on the net offsetting positions between CME and FICC, each clearing house may reduce that firm's performance bond requirements. If a participating firm defaults, the gain or loss on the liquidation of the firm’s open positions and the proceeds from the liquidation of the cross margin account would be allocated between CME and FICC pursuant to a publicly-available cross-margining agreement. In the event of a remaining loss, CME would first apply assets of the defaulting clearing firm to satisfy its payment obligation. These assets include the defaulting firm's guaranty fund contributions, performance bonds and any other available assets, such as assets required for clearing membership and any associated trading rights. Thereafter, if the payment default remains unsatisfied, the clearing house would use its corporate contributions designated for the respective financial safeguard package. The clearing house would then use guaranty fund contributions of other clearing firms within the respective financial safeguard package and funds collected through an assessment against solvent clearing firms within the respective financial safeguard package to satisfy the deficit. Each clearing firm for futures and options is required to deposit and maintain specified guaranty fund contributions in the form of cash or U.S. Treasury securities (base guaranty fund). In the event that performance bonds, guaranty fund contributions and other assets required to support clearing membership of a defaulting clearing firm are inadequate to fulfill that clearing firm's outstanding financial obligation, the base guaranty fund for contracts other than interest rate swaps is available to cover potential losses after first utilizing $100.0 million of corporate contributions designated by CME to be used in the event of a default of a clearing firm for the base guaranty fund. The clearing house maintains a separate guaranty fund to support the clearing firms that clear interest rate swap products (cleared interest rate swaps contract guaranty fund). The funds for interest rate swaps are independent of the base guaranty fund and are isolated to clearing firms for products in the respective asset class. Each clearing firm for cleared interest rate swaps is required to deposit and maintain specified guaranty fund contributions in the form of cash or U.S. Treasury securities. In the event that performance bonds, guaranty fund contributions and other assets required to support clearing membership of a defaulting clearing firm for cleared interest rate swap contracts are inadequate to fulfill that clearing firm's outstanding financial obligation, the interest rate swaps contracts guaranty fund is available to cover potential losses after first utilizing $150.0 million of corporate contributions designated by CME to be used in the event of a default of a cleared interest rate swap clearing firm. CME maintains a 364-day multi-currency line of credit with a consortium of domestic and international banks to be used in certain situations by the clearing house. CME may use the proceeds to provide temporary liquidity in the unlikely event of a clearing firm default, in the event of a liquidity constraint or default by a depositary (custodian of the collateral), or in the event of a temporary disruption with the domestic payments system that would delay payment of settlement variation between CME and its clearing firms. Clearing firm guaranty fund contributions received in the form of cash or U.S. Treasury securities as well as the performance bond assets of a defaulting firm can be used to collateralize the facility. The line of credit provides for borrowings of up to $7.0 billion. At December 31, 2024, guaranty fund contributions available to collateralize the facility were $10.1 billion. CME has the option to request an increase in the line from $7.0 billion to $10.0 billion, subject to the approval of participating banks. In addition to the 364-day fully secured, committed multi-currency line of credit, the company also has the option to use the $2.3 billion multi-currency revolving senior credit facility to provide liquidity for the clearing house in the unlikely event of default. The company maintains committed repurchase facility agreements amounting to a total of $1.0 billion. The committed repurchase facilities provide access to cash, secured by non-cash collateral, in the event that one or more of our clearing firms fails to promptly discharge an obligation to the clearing house. The facilities are subject to annual renewal. The company currently does not have any borrowings outstanding under these facilities. CME also maintains a committed facility of up to $750.0 million for foreign currency conversions. The committed foreign currency facility allows the clearing house to convert cash to another currency within generally accepted local market timeframes in the event that one or more of our clearing firms fails to promptly discharge an obligation to the clearing house. The facility is subject to annual renewal. The company currently does not have any foreign currency trades outstanding under this facility. The clearing house is required under the U.S. Commodity Exchange Act to segregate cash and securities deposited by clearing firms from its clearing member customers. In addition, the clearing house requires segregation of all funds deposited by its clearing firms from operating funds. Cash and non-cash deposits held as performance bonds and guaranty fund contributions at fair value at December 31, 2024 and 2023 were as follows:
|  | 2024 |  | 2023
(in millions) |  | Cash |  | Non-Cash Deposits and IEF Funds (1) |  | Cash |  | Non-Cash Deposits and IEF Funds (1)
Performance bonds |  | $ | 96,036.4 |  |  | $ | 191,241.1 |  |  | $ | 87,285.5 |  |  | $ | 180,866.3 |
Guaranty fund contributions |  | 2,343.5 |  |  | 7,977.2 |  |  | 2,379.6 |  |  | 6,849.6 |
Cross-margin arrangements |  | 233.1 |  |  | 678.5 |  |  | 183.1 |  |  | 1,374.5 |
Other(2) |  | 282.4 |  |  | 2.1 |  |  | 344.3 |  |  | 2.1 |
Total |  | $ | 98,895.4 |  |  | $ | 199,898.9 |  |  | $ | 90,192.5 |  |  | $ | 189,092.5 |
_______________ (1) IEF funds include customer-directed investments in IEF funds that are not included on the consolidated balance sheets. (2) Other includes collateral for delivery and accrued interest earned on collateral reinvestment due to the clearing firms. Cross-margin arrangements include collateral for the cross-margin accounts with OCC and FICC. Cash performance bonds may include intraday settlement, if any, that is owed to the clearing firms and paid the following business day. The balance of intraday settlements was $198.4 million and $237.5 million at December 31, 2024 and 2023, respectively. Intraday settlements may be invested on an overnight basis and are offset by an equal liability owed to clearing firms. In addition to cash, securities and other non-cash deposits, irrevocable letters of credit may be used as performance bond deposits for clearing firms. At December 31, 2024 and 2023, these letters of credit, which are not included in the accompanying consolidated balance sheets, were as follows:
(in millions) |  | 2024 |  | 2023
Performance bonds |  | $ | 4,254.8 |  |  | $ | 3,916.7 |
Performance bond collateral for delivery |  | 3,505.9 |  |  | 4,631.4 |
Total Letters of Credit |  | $ | 7,760.7 |  |  | $ | 8,548.1 |
_______________ All cash, securities and letters of credit posted as performance bonds are only available to meet the financial obligations of that clearing firm to the clearing house.

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