Shanghai crude oil futures opened up more than 6 percent on Monday with almost 20
million barrels of the most-active September contract changing hands in the first 25 minutes as China debuted its oil benchmark.

The launch of China’s yuan-denominated oil futures marked the culmination of a decade-long push by the Shanghai Futures Exchange (ShFE) aimed at giving the world’s largest energy consumer more power in pricing crude sold to Asia.

The most-active September contract opened at 440.4 yuan per barrel from a reference point of 416 yuan, and jumped to as high as 447.1 yuan in the first few minutes.

At 9:24 a.m. (0224 GMT) prices were up 3.29 percent at 430 yuan, with 19,122 lots, equal to 19.1 million barrels of oil, traded.