The Commodity Exchange is shortening sessions.

The New York exchange said it was shortening its trading hours Monday and today to allow member firms to catch up with paper work from record-volume sessions in the last couple of weeks. Exchange governors voted to end trading for those days between 11:45 a.m and noon EDT for contracts on gold, silver, copper and aluminum. On normal days, trading stops between 2 p.m. and 2:30 p.m. In recent sessions, the daily trading average has been more than double the normal average, the exchange said.