CME Group: Helping investors mitigate risk and capitalise on opportunities with real-time access to market data in the cloud

Google Cloud results

• Delivers access to market data for about 10 percent of the cost of traditional means
• Offers flexible on-demand, pay-as-you-go model for market data consumption, paving the way to reach a broader target customer audience
• Expands global access footprint, delivering market data through more than 20 computing locations around the world

Making market data more accessible than ever before

As the world’s leading derivatives marketplaces, CME Group understands that its customers rely on having the right data to respond instantly to global market-moving events and to mitigate risk. To respond to this need, CME Group had to reimagine how its customers receive real-time market data directly. Partnering with Google Cloud, CME Group aimed to revolutionise the 20-year-old data connectivity and delivery model and make it easier for customers to immediately access data directly from anywhere in the world.

CME Group has built a reputation for giving investors what they need most: accurate, reliable market data. Today, CME Group’s customers—including banks, hedge funds, retail investors, and cryptocurrency traders—use this information to manage their risks, inform their investment strategies, and guide business decision-making.

Before CME Group engaged with Google Cloud, customers could access CME Group’s data in two ways: by colocating in its data center in Illinois or by subscribing to a market data aggregator service. Over the past decade, however, demand for data grew and CME Group heard from more and more customers who wanted access that was easier, faster, and more cost-effective. In addition, many businesses were expecting to manage data in the cloud, which made it essential that CME Group offer a cloud-based data service.

CME Group becomes the first exchange to offer real-time futures and options market data in the cloud

To deliver real-time access to market data to its customers worldwide, CME Group chose to work with Google Cloud, which is known for its expertise in data and global network strength. Google Cloud also offers an hourly fee model for cloud-computing usage, and it facilitates the use of historical and real-time market data in the cloud—all at scale, securely and easily.

In addition, CME Group saw the opportunity to take advantage of the Pub/Sub real-time messaging service so its customers could receive messages and data through more than 20 computing locations globally. This service reduces the complexity, expense, and operational overhead of receiving real-time market data.

CME Group leveraged Pub/Sub to create a new service that gives customers real-time, delayed SBE FIX and JASON formatmarket data in the cloud through a highly flexible, on-demand, pay-as-you-go structure. In November 2019, CME Group became the first derivatives exchange to offer cloud-based real-time futures and options market data.

CME Group can now reach 10,000 subscribers on a single data stream, and with 10 TB of data per second. Customers can access a full day’s history of market activity in less than 20 seconds. And by offering access to its market data on demand in a pay-as-you-go consumption model, CME Group can reach new customer segments.

"Our clients around the world increasingly are looking for high-quality real-time data in the cloud," says Trey Berre, CME Group Global Head of Data Services. "This innovative collaboration with Google Cloud makes it easier not only for our clients to access the data they need from anywhere with an internet connection, but also to integrate our market data into new cloud-based technologies."

How data in the cloud helps CME Group customers mitigate risk, reduce costs

In the past, it was challenging for firms to gauge their risk exposure in real time. Infrequent pricing data and limited access to historical market data made decision-making difficult. At the same time, setting up a data operation was often too costly or complex for many firms.

Data delivered via Google Cloud helps customers overcome these hurdles, making it possible to get real-time quotes via Pub/Sub in an efficient and cost-effective way. Customers can combine, in a single workspace, CME Group’s real time and delayed data with historical data from Google Cloud’s public datasets, as well as other public and commercial datasets, for a comprehensive overview of market movements. Now, firms’ positions can be marked to market throughout the trading day, enabling customers to stay on top of the slightest changes in risk exposure.

Because they can now access data through the cloud, there’s no need for customers to set up a hub at CME Group’s data center, or to provision servers, install a network, or manage infrastructure. This reduces customers’ costs, which in turn makes the overall cost of data and licensing through CME Group lower as well. Customers can access market data more cost-effectively for about 10 percent of the cost of traditional means. This can amount to a savings of thousands of dollars a month, depending on the customer location.

CME Group also helps customers on traditional systems divest themselves from those platforms and transition to the cloud. This "cloud-scaling" approach allows customers to reap the benefits of accessing market data in the cloud, while leveraging existing technology investments.

A successful and ongoing partnership

CME Group continues its tradition of being an innovator in the financial services industry. As Berre concludes, "Our engagement with Google Cloud is a major milestone in our journey to delivering an on-demand and flexible market data model. We're always looking for ways we can reach new communities and help customers access our highly liquid markets and the data they generate, so our partnership with Google Cloud is more important than ever."