The Chicago Mercantile Exchange started trading bitcoin futures Sunday evening, becoming the second major U.S. exchange to do so. Its competitor, the Chicago Board Options Exchange, started trading bitcoin futures last week.
According to The Associated Press, the futures were trading lower after their CME debut. By 2:00 a.m. EST Monday, the futures contract that expires in January was at $19,440.00 after opening at $20,650. The bitcoin itself was priced at $18, 928 as of 2:42 a.m. EST, according to Coindesk.
Bitcoin, the most widely known cryptocurrency, has been on a tear of late, with the price soaring more than 1,800 percent from $1,000 in January to $19,000 earlier this month. That spike has prompted many informed observers, from legendary investor Warren Buffett to Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz, to call the bitcoin market a bubble.
“It is a highly speculative asset,” outgoing Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen said last week. There is “a limited need for it and substantial concerns,” she added.
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