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Cboe Exchange Puts Brakes on Bitcoin Futures Listing
Cboe said it would not add a new bitcoin futures market for March, citing a need to review how it approaches the space.

Cboe Futures Exchange (CFE) is putting its bitcoin futures market on hold.
The unit of Cboe Global Markets said Thursday that it would not add a new bitcoin futures market for March, citing a need to review how it approaches the space.
"CFE is not adding a Cboe Bitcoin (USD) (“XBT”) futures contract for trading in March 2019," the futures exchange said in a notice to traders Thursday afternoon, adding:
"CFE is assessing its approach with respect to how it plans to continue to offer digital asset derivatives for trading. While it considers its next steps, CFE does not currently intend to list additional XBT futures contracts for trading."
However, Cboe said currently listed bitcoin futures contracts will remain available for trading. That means the last contracts listed, XBTM19, will expire in June.

Cboe, along with rival Chicago futures exchange CME Group, made a big splash in late 2017 when each introduced bitcoin futures contracts. But by many accounts, Cboe's volume has been disappointing.
That's cause Cboe bitcoin futures trading volumes have been getting crushed by CME. pic.twitter.com/4dpi9Tfuwg
— John Todaro (@JohnTodaro1) March 14, 2019
The Chicago exchanges' futures are cash-settled, meaning at the end of the contract one party pays the other the difference between the spot and futures prices of bitcoin in U.S. dollars.
By contrast, up-and-coming competitors Bakkt and ErisX plan to offer physically settled futures contracts, in which real bitcoin is delivered to the buyer.
Cboe image via Shutterstock.
Marc Hochstein
As Deputy Editor-in-Chief for Features, Opinion, Ethics and Standards, Marc oversees CoinDesk's long-form content, sets editorial policies and acts as the ombudsman for our industry-leading newsroom. He is also spearheading our nascent coverage of prediction markets and helps compile The Node, our daily email newsletter rounding up the biggest stories in crypto. From November 2022 to June 2024 Marc was the Executive Editor of Consensus, CoinDesk's flagship annual event. He joined CoinDesk in 2017 as a managing editor and has steadily added responsibilities over the years. Marc is a veteran journalist with more than 25 years' experience, including 17 years at the trade publication American Banker, the last three as editor-in-chief, where he was responsible for some of the earliest mainstream news coverage of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. DISCLOSURE: Marc holds BTC above CoinDesk's disclosure threshold of $1,000; marginal amounts of ETH, SOL, XMR, ZEC, MATIC and EGIRL; an Urbit planet (~fodrex-malmev); two ENS domain names (MarcHochstein.eth and MarcusHNYC.eth); and NFTs from the Oekaki (pictured), Lil Skribblers, SSRWives, and Gwar collections.
