CME Group launches ETH futures options trading

The announcement of the launch of options trading for its Ether (ETH) futures products appeared Monday on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange Group (CME Group) derivatives platform. The Ethereum merger is also planned for this week.

According to CME Group Global Director of Equities and FX Products Tim McCourt, it is just in time to launch a new futures contract.

According to McCourt, interest in Ether derivatives is growing because the market and its participants are waiting for the results of the influence on one of the largest cryptocurrency networks from the upcoming Ethereum merger.

On August 18, there was an announcement of the intention to launch futures options by the world's leading derivatives market CME Group. According to the statement, Ether prices will be in U.S. dollars, the base currency rate of which is updated daily. According to the announcement, one Ether futures will offer a price of 50 ETH per contract.

The line of existing products of CME Group stays fully available, only new contracts are added to it. In December 2017, the first CME Group bitcoin futures contract was launched. Despite the cryptocurrency winter, bitcoin (BTC) and ETH derivatives contracts generated record high interest in the second quarter of this year.

In January 2020, the BTC options trading product by CME Group was launched. In December 2021, futures contracts for micro-ether were launched. In March 2022, option contracts on existing CME micro-BTC and ETH futures were launched for 10% of token size. Euro-denominated futures for BTC and ETH are also offered by CME Group.

Confirmation of the Ethereum blockchain is ready for a merger has been received from Ethereum developers. As part of this merger, there will be a transition from a proof-of-work mechanism to a consensus "proof-of-share" mechanism. The completion of the merger is scheduled to be on September 15.

The crypto market may be subject to greater volatility due to the merger and the release of the U.S. Consumer Price Index (CPI) data for August on September 15.

Sources: CME Group, Сointelegraph.com