The trading volume of Ethereum futures on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) rose to 388 contracts or more than $30M during the first trading session, according to data provided by the platform.
The open interest (OI) in the new instrument has jumped to 228 contracts ($20.2M). One contract is equivalent to 50 ETH. CME Group CEO Tim McCourt said:
"The response to Ether has been overwhelming."
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Shortly before this new futures product was rolled out on CME some market participants predicted the Ether price would face strong pressure as well as a trend reversal, just as happened with the Bitcoin price back in 2017 after the launch of futures based on the crypto. Nevertheless, the world's second largest cryptocurrency by market cap has continued to grow and in less than a day has hit an all-time high of $1,800.