London: Garry Jones retired as chief executive officer of the London Metal Exchange after a three-year stint steering the world’s biggest metals bourse.

Jones also retired from his other positions at LME owner Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing Ltd. with immediate effect, HKEX said in a statement. Matthew Chamberlain, LME’s chief operating officer, will be interim CEO, and Jones will be retained as an adviser until the end of this year, it said.

Jones was hired by HKEX CEO Charles Li in September 2013 to lead the LME’s transition to a more profit-driven model. But the formerly member-owned institution has faced complaints from its customers over higher fees and seen volumes fall in each of the past two years.

“We thank Garry for the contributions he has made to the transformation of the LME over the last few years and we wish him the best in his new endeavours,” Li said in Monday’s statement.

Chamberlain was named LME COO in December, succeeding Stuart Sloan. He’d previously been head of business development at the bourse.

Founded in the nineteenth century, LME was bought by HKEX for $2.2 billion (Dh8.08 billion) in late 2012, and the new owners sought to turn the world’s biggest metals exchange into a more profitable operation by increasing fees and attracting new types of users.

Jones presided over rising profits for the exchange, which sets global prices for industrial metals including copper, nickel and aluminium. At the same time, the LME overhauled warehouse regulation amid calls for tougher rules on commodities trading. The LME also tried to attract high-frequency traders and promoted monthly settled contracts, which are used by US metals exchanges.

Jones and Li also battled industry complaints about falling trading volumes and higher charges, introduced as HKEX sought to recoup its investment. Average daily volume in 2016 was down 7.7 per cent from the previous year. In its latest earnings statement, the bourse said commodity revenue in the first nine months of 2016 fell 11 per cent compared to the year-earlier period.

“Members have had a very tough year, their volumes are down, their revenues are down,” Jones said in an interview in October. “You’re starting to see difficult markets and you’re starting to feel it more.”

LME said in December it would freeze its main clearing charges for 2017 and offer concessions to producers and consumers, including granting traders free access to data. The bourse cut trading fees in September following criticism from members and users.

On January 12, the LME suffered its second major outage in less than six months as trading was delayed by what the exchange described as a connectivity issue. The electronic platform also stopped operating on July 22, resulting in traders picking up the phone to make orders. LME also cited a connectivity issue at that time.