CME Group Announces Pricing of $612.5 Million of Senior Notes in Connection with Its Proposed Index Services Joint Venture

CHICAGO, March 8 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- CME Group Inc. announced today that its subsidiary, CME Group Index Services LLC, has priced an offering of $612.5 million in aggregate principal amount of 4.40% senior notes due 2018.  The sale of the notes is expected to be completed on or about March 18, 2010, subject to customary closing conditions.

The notes will be fully and unconditionally guaranteed on a senior basis by CME Group Inc.  CME Group Index Services will be the wholly-owned subsidiary of a new joint venture that will be 90% owned by CME Group and 10% owned by Dow Jones & Company and will own the Dow Jones Indexes business and the CBOT market data services business.  The offering of the notes and the transactions creating the joint venture are expected to close concurrently.  CME Group Index Services will use the net proceeds from the offering to fund a special distribution of approximately $607.5 million to Dow Jones & Company.  Any net proceeds in excess of such amount will be used by CME Group Index Services for general corporate purposes.

The notes and the related guarantee will only be offered to qualified institutional buyers pursuant to Rule 144A under the United States Securities Act of 1933, as amended ("Securities Act") and to non-US persons pursuant to Regulation S under the Securities Act.  The notes and the related guarantee have not been registered under the Securities Act or any state securities laws, and may not be offered or sold in the United States absent registration or an applicable exemption from the registration requirements of the Securities Act and applicable state securities laws.

This announcement is neither an offer to sell nor a solicitation of an offer to buy any securities and shall not constitute an offer, solicitation or sale in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful. Any offers of the notes and the related guarantee will be made exclusively by means of a private offering memorandum.

Statements contained in this announcement may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. CME Group's actual results may differ materially from those set forth in any forward-looking statements due to a number of risks, uncertainties and other factors, as described in CME Group's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.  CME Group does not assume any obligation to update its forward-looking statements.

As the world's leading and most diverse derivatives marketplace, CME Group (www.cmegroup.com) is where the world comes to manage risk.  CME Group exchanges offer the widest range of global benchmark products across all major asset classes, including futures and options based on interest rates, equity indexes, foreign exchange, energy, agricultural commodities, metals, weather and real estate.   CME Group brings buyers and sellers together through its CME Globex® electronic trading platform and its trading facilities in New York and Chicago.  CME Group also operates CME Clearing, one of the largest central counterparty clearing services in the world, which provides clearing and settlement services for exchange-traded contracts, as well as for over-the-counter derivatives transactions through CME ClearPort®.   These products and services ensure that businesses everywhere can substantially mitigate counterparty credit risk in both listed and over-the-counter derivatives markets.  

The Globe logo, CME, Chicago Mercantile Exchange, CME Group, Globex, E-mini and CME ClearPort are trademarks of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc.  CBOT and Chicago Board of Trade are trademarks of the Board of Trade of the City of Chicago.  NYMEX and New York Mercantile Exchange are trademarks of New York Mercantile Exchange, Inc.  COMEX is a trademark of Commodity Exchange, Inc.  All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.  Further information about CME Group (Nasdaq: CME) and its products can be found at www.cmegroup.com.

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SOURCE CME Group