TEXT OF STORY

Doug Krizner: NYMEX Holdings owns the New York Mercantile Exchange. This exchange trades energy, like oil and natural gas, along with precious metals. In the last few weeks, NYMEX has been openly looking for a merger partner. It’s reportedly talked to everyone from the New York Stock Exchange to the Chicago Board of Trade. Stacey Vanek-Smith has more.

Stacey Vanek-Smith: The commodities market is kind of like the Wild West of Wall Street. It deals in things like oil, gold, copper and wheat.

It’s notoriously volatile and generally not considered a safe place to put your money. NYMEX is the largest commodities exchange in the world and it’s been on an upward tear.

Stephen Leeb: I think that’s just the beginning of what could be a very, very dramatic bull market. And NYMEX, you know, that’s the place to be.

That’s Stephen Leeb of Leeb Capital management. He says more and more investors are getting into the market. That’s because countries like China and India are growing fast and they have a huge appetite for commodities.

Leeb: What the developing world needs to sustain this growth, and they’ve gotta grow, are commodities. Whether it be oil, whether it be copper, whether it be corn, it just follows that you are going to see ever-higher commodity prices.

NYMEX is currently worth more than $11.5 billion. Leeb says it could use the extra cash from a merger to help it manage its explosive growth.

I’m Stacey Vanek-Smith for Marketplace.