Bakkt Bitcoin futures contract volumes have doubled on day two. Will the news help stem today’s bloodbath on the crypto markets?

Bakkt has revealed that volumes on day two of its physically-backed Bitcoin futures contracts have more than doubled.

Bakkt reports 166 contracts for 1 BTC each have changed hands – that’s equivalent to around $1.4 million worth of Bitcoin.

The monthly futures data shows 216 BTC have been traded, up 145 in the past day.

The daily futures data is unavailable at the time of writing, however.

Bakkt claims price discovery is unfolding

“Price discovery unfolding before our eyes,” Bakkt tweeted a couple of hours ago.

“On our second day of operations, totally transparent trading in monthly Bakkt Futures Contracts shows Bitcoin ending the day at $8,560 on 166 lots changing hands.”

Launched on a Sunday night in the US, the much anticipated physically backed futures contract aimed at institutional investors turned over just 71 BTC contracts in its first day.

That’s exponentially less (75x difference) than CME futures’ first-day volume of 5298 BTC in December 2017.

The much-anticipated launch was heralded by many as the moment institutions would arrive en masse to pump Bitcoin to the next level.

That hasn’t happened yet, although today’s increase shows volume is at least headed in the right direction.

There are differences – CME futures are settled with the cash equivalent, and many of Bakkt’s largest prospective institutional clients are yet to receive permission to deal in futures settled with Bitcoin.

Another potential difference is that the launch of CME futures was followed shortly thereafter by the start of a year-long bear market.

Fast motion car crash

Overnight crypto markets plunged due to unmet skyhigh expectations about the Bakkt launch.

Bitcoin and XRP lost more than 10% in the past 24 hours, and altcoins plunged even further with Ethereum down 16.1% and EOS, Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin SV all losing more than 20%.

Senior analyst at eToro, Mati Greenspan said he was taking the opportunity to buy the dip.