OCC’s stock loan clearing service continued its strong start to 2017 in February.

Close to 162,000 securities lending trades took place via the CPP last month, up 8% on the same period last year.

The February figure was slightly down on the 180,600 trades seen in January. However, activity remains 19% higher year-to-date.

OCC’s stock loan CCP service has been in place for two decades, mostly catering for the broker-to-broker market.

However, the Chicago-based business is enhancing its model and aims to attract agent lenders and beneficial owners.

"We hope to have a revised model in place by the end of 2017, subject to regulatory approvals, which offers clear benefits to the lending community," Chip Dempsey, OCC’s chief commercial officer, said earlier this year.

Meanwhile, OCC’s cleared futures volume jumped by 57% in February.

Year-to-date average daily cleared futures volume is up 45%.

Overall exchange-listed options volume topped 323 million contracts in February.

That was 3% lower when compared to February 2016 while activity is down 5% year-on-year.