You could be forgiven for being surprised that global futures markets opened up this morning, or any recent morning, because, at least since trading went electronic and exchanges went for profit, the world has been nearing the end-of-days, lights-out apocalypse for clearing firms. Capital requirements, margin regulations, prudential regulators butting in, reporting, compliance and so on. No clearing, no trading. And yet more than 11.4 billion contracts were traded and CLEARED in the first quarter of this year alone.