Bakkt, a subsidiary of Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), has just announced it has started trading physically-settled bitcoin futures on its platform.
Bakkt started offering bitcoin futures trading at 8 p.m. ET (00:00 UTC, September 23).
This is the first platform of its kind to be approved by U.S. regulators, although it has not been an easy way. The company announced it planned to launch this new investment instrument more than a year ago, however, the launch has been delayed several times.
Bakkt started testing the service in late July, while at the end of August it was reported that the platform would start accepting bitcoin deposits from September 6.
On August 16, the company announced it had received approval from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and that the trading of physically-settled BTC futures would start today.
While CME and CBOE already offer bitcoin futures trading, they settled in cash. However, Bakkt's futures contracts allow investors to receive bitcoin instead of its equivalent value in fiat money at the expiration of the contract.
Subscribe to our Telegram channel to stay up to date on the latest crypto and blockchain news.