Ticker symbol: ICE

Where traded: New York Stock Exchange

(ENLARGE)

Jeffrey C. Sprecher

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Chief executive: Jeffrey C. Sprecher, 52

Headquarters: Atlanta

Business summary: Founded in Atlanta in 2000, IntercontinentalExchange — known best by its stock symbol as ICE — is a global, Internet-based exchange where contracts are traded in oil, electricity, coffee, cotton, stocks and currency futures. Among ICE's acquisitions beginning in 2001 have been the International Petroleum Exchange in Europe, the New York Board of Trade and the Winnipeg Commodity Exchange. ICE made an unsuccessful bid in 2007 for the Chicago Board of Trade. Company founder Sprecher, 52, answered questions about the company.

Q: One result of the mortgage crisis was a virtual cutoff in credit in the broader financial markets. How has this affected your operations or planning? How have you responded?

A: The biggest issue is that it has impacted the Wall Street banks who are our major participants in the markets we host. But it seems to have affected them in over-the-counter swaps and derivatives [exotic financial securities] and not so much in exchange traded derivatives, which is what we tend to host. We can see that our customers are hurting, but they are giving us as much business as before.

Q: What's on the horizon for your company that you can talk about, such as an acquisition, stock offering or buyback, new products, expansion.

A: The space my company is in continues to be very active. There is still a lot of consolidation going on. The movement to electronic trading is also continuing. The growth of the global economy outside the U.S. has caused Western companies to look abroad for growth, and you see this reflected in mergers and acquisitions. We really haven't seen a consolidation in the Asian market, but we are beginning to see consolidation in South America. People are looking for global franchises.

We also continue to invest in technology. And that's one of the nice things about being in Atlanta. Because of the cutting edge of our technology, we recruit people globally. And Atlanta has continued to be an attractive place to do that. It has the amenities of country living, it has ethnic diversity and a reasonable cost of living. Not many places have that and it makes recruiting easier.

Q: Your company handles trading in oil, natural gas and farm commodities. How does the current political campaign and regulatory environment look with that in mind?

A: Because we are a venue for trading commodities, we are seeing lot of talk on Capital Hill, on both sides of the aisle, about somehow legislating the price of gasoline, the price of corn, soybeans, wheat, sugar. But the global demand for commodities doesn't seem to be recognized by our leaders in Washington. It is serious in that there does seem to be an appetite for a quick fix.

[This month, ICE opposed Congressional proposals to regulate global energy exchanges, saying: "The well-documented rise in worldwide demand for crude oil cannot be impacted by government-imposed market controls. The various trading proposals by Senate Democrats would result in adverse consequences for consumers, market prices and on the competitiveness of the U.S. markets."]

–Tom Walker