CME Bitcoin Futures Top $1 Billion for the Third Time Ever

The demand in the Bitcoin futures market has been exploding as of late — led by optimism about the leading cryptocurrency’s prospects for 2020. With the halving event scheduled for May, interest is growing and it’s reflected in the futures market. At just the CME alone, Bitcoin futures recorded a stunning $1.1B in daily trading volume. The explosive volume is something that we have not seen in months. In fact, the last time CME posted over $1B in trading volume for Bitcoin futures was in May 2019. In comparison, daily trading volume for CME Bitcoin futures was often well under $300M, in some cases, for much of December. Now, CME Bitcoin Futures markets are, once again, becoming hot in the financial world. As skew (@skewdotcom) reports, after a long weekend, Bitcoin futures posted an impressive $1.1B. The steady uptick in the past two months should be noted.

$1.1bln bitcoin futures traded yesterday at CME after the long weekend – only third time we record > $1bln pic.twitter.com/dxoblqOvUb

— skew (@skewdotcom) February 19, 2020

Of course, this uptick in Bitcoin futures activity is strongly correlated with Bitcoin’s price. On January 1, Bitcoin was trading around $7,300 but has since had a significant rally to $9,790 at the time of writing. Increasing futures volume, however, is not indicative of positive price movement necessarily. Traders could also be betting on Bitcoin’s dropping lower. However, it is a positive indicator of market activity and demand. In other words, more people are paying attention to Bitcoin than they had in previous months — and may be a healthy sign for the market overall. Generally speaking, an increase in open interest in futures markets is a bullish sign in the longer-term — if these trading volumes hold and can establish a new trend. Bitcoin Futures are not the only metric to judge an increasing public interest in Bitcoin. As BeInCrypto reported recently, Bitcoin-related Google searches recently increased by 33 percent.