At 9:00 AM on September 10, 2026, options on Hot-Rolled Coil, Stainless Steel, and Low-Sulfur Fuel Oil officially began trading at the Shanghai Futures Exchange (SHFE, including the Shanghai International Energy Exchange). These three options were simultaneously opened to Qualified Foreign Investors (QFI), with the Low-Sulfur Fuel Oil option, as a domestically designated variety, directly allowing overseas traders to participate in transactions.

All three options—Hot-Rolled Coil, Stainless Steel, and Low-Sulfur Fuel Oil—are American-style options. On the first trading day, the Hot-Rolled Coil option listed contracts corresponding to HC2612 and HC2701; the Stainless Steel option listed contracts for SS2612 and SS2701; and the Low-Sulfur Fuel Oil option initiated contracts for LU2701 and LU2702. A total of 236 contracts were listed on the debut day, comprising 48 for Hot-Rolled Coil options, 50 for Stainless Steel options, and 138 for Low-Sulfur Fuel Oil options.

Since the launch of the Copper option in 2018, the options market at the SHFE has grown steadily with continuous expansion in market size. In the first half of 2026, the average daily trading volume of options on the exchange reached 2.2168 million lots, a year-on-year increase of 63.74%, while the average daily open interest stood at 1.6284 million lots, up 13.98% year-on-year. With the addition of these three new options, the total number of options listed on the SHFE has increased to 23, covering major sectors such as non-ferrous metals, precious metals, ferrous metals, and energy chemicals, marking the basic formation of the exchange's "futures plus options" three-dimensional product system.

Alongside the steady expansion of market scale, the role of options in serving the real economy has become increasingly prominent. Options tools offer industrial enterprises a wider array of strategies for managing price risks across procurement, inventory management, and sales processes, helping them enhance risk management capabilities and strengthen operational resilience. On the same day, the SHFE organized a symposium on the functionality of options, inviting relevant enterprises and institutions to discuss market performance of listed option products, risk management practices of industrial firms, and improvements in market-making service quality. The session aimed to gather frontline insights and build market consensus on how the options market can better support the real economy.

A representative from the SHFE noted that the futures for Hot-Rolled Coil, Stainless Steel, and Low-Sulfur Fuel Oil have been trading for years with stable performance, establishing themselves as vital risk management tools for downstream industries. The listing of these three options represents a significant step in the exchange's efforts to expand capacity and enhance quality, further deepening and broadening services for related sectors. Looking ahead, the SHFE will continue to ensure stable market operations, refine its product lineup, optimize rules and regulations, and strengthen market cultivation and investor education. The focus will remain on elevating market quality and service efficiency to better meet the diverse and refined risk management needs of industrial enterprises, thereby supporting the high-quality development of the real economy.