Crypto Derivative Volumes Rose in March for Third Straight Month

Crypto derivatives trading volumes across both centralized and decentralized exchanges rose for a third consecutive month in March, the first three-month streak since at least January 2022, according to figures from CCData.

Crypto derivatives are financial contracts such as futures and options that relate to cryptocurrencies. They are popular because they allow market participants to hedge their positions or to speculate on market direction.

Derivatives trading accounted for about 74% of the roughly $4 trillion crypto market volume last month, the data show. While the bulk of derivatives trading took place on centralized exchanges (CEX), decentralized exchanges (DEX) accounted for $68.7 billion, with dYdX taking a 62.6% share.

“We expect decentralized derivatives protocols to continue performing well and gain market share in the next quarter,” said CCData in a report.

There has been an increasing trend of spot DEXs adding derivatives trading to their platforms as they notice the potential of derivative DEXs, according to CCData.

In March, DEX PancakeSwap announced it was partnering with ApolloX to introduce trading of perpetual swaps. Quickswap, a decentralized exchange built on Polygon, is also launching perpetual products soon, CCData said.