The foreign exchange market may be less of a leviathan than sometimes imagined. "For the first time in 15 years, FX trading volumes contracted between two consecutive Triennial Surveys," the Bank for International Settlements said over the weekend.Global FX trading fell to US$5.1 trillion per day in April 2016, from US$5.4 trillion in April 2013, the BIS said, based on a survey of around 1300 dealers."In particular, spot trading fell to US$1.7 trillion per day in April 2016, from US$2.0 trillion in 2013. "In contrast, trading in most FX derivatives, particularly FX swaps, continued to grow. In addition, a number of emerging market economy currencies gained market share, most notably the renminbi."The decline in trading by leveraged institutions and 'fast money' traders, and a reduction in risk appetite, have contributed to a significant drop in spot market activity, the BIS said.Balancing that, "participation in FX markets has shifted towards less leveraged and more risk-averse participants. A first indication of such a shift is that trading involving institutional investors, such as insurance companies and pension funds, grew by a third between 2013 and 2016. "These types of long-term investors tend to exhibit lower tolerance for foreign currency risk in their portfolios and use FX markets to hedge such risks. Indeed, their FX swap trading volume rose by approximately 80 per cent to more than a quarter of a trillion US dollars per day in 2016."