Monday, May 5, 2008

Business Week's Top 50 No. 15 - CME Group

No. 15: CME Group

Industry: Specialized Finance
Sales: $2 billion
Net Income: $658.5 million

When a rival group tried to muscle in on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange's deal to buy the Chicago Board of Trade last year, the Merc ponied up $3 billion more, paying $11.9 billion to create CME Group (CME). The deal has made CME the global leader in derivatives. Net income soared 62%, to $659 million, in 2007, as revenue jumped 61%, to some $2 billion. CEO Craig Donohue plans to make the Merc bigger still, offering more than $9 billion in cash and stock to acquire Nymex Holdings, parent of the New York Mercantile Exchange. But the stock has been bludgeoned by doubts about whether such deals will fly; the Justice Dept. has suggested CME has too much market power. CME may have more competition soon, from an exchange planned by investment banks.

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