17 May 2018 00:00, UTC

CME Group or the Chicago Mercantile Exchange is reviewing the opportunity to trade Ethereum futures. Reportedly, this has been stated by Tim McCourt (who leads equity products department in the company) on the sidelines of Consensus 2018, the vast blockchain forum currently held in Manhattan.

“Reviewing” does not mean “vowing”: the final decision will be based upon the customer demand in connection with the newly-opened Ethereum tracking index. Due to the high popularity of cryptocurrencies, one might expect the opening, but should not be surprised in case CME decides to stick with Bitcoin futures only.

As a reminder, this is one of the Chicago exchanges which has launched Bitcoin futures last year. The leadership of the second one - CBOE or the Chicago Board Options Exchange - has stated about its openness to the concept of altcoin futures. According to some older reports on Bitnewstoday, CME fears reputational losses in case something goes wrong.

The new Ethereum index Tim McCourt was mentioning has recently been launched by CME and aside from a new trustworthy source traders now have, two reference cryptocurrency exchanges - Bitstamp and Kraken - have undoubtedly benefited due to a new source of promotion.

Ethereum’s price may considerably change prior to the launch and after it, just as it happened with Bitcoin. One can read the brief report on the expert analysis of Bitcoin price dynamics in 2017 to get the idea what may happen to Ethereum in the near future.

Image courtesy of Laura He / SCMP

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