Chicago-based derivatives exchange CME Group is seeking to deepen its exposure to altcoins as demand for regulated crypto products continues to grow in the United States.
CME Group he said on Thursday said it plans to publish futures contracts tied to Cardano (ADA), Chainlink (LINK) and Stellar (XLM) on February 9, pending regulatory approval.
The proposed contracts will expand CME’s suite of cryptocurrency derivatives regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which includes futures and options linked to Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), XRP (XRP) and Solana (SOL). The exchange said the fresh offerings are aimed at meeting growing interest from market participants seeking exposure to digital assets.
CME plans to offer both standard and micro futures on each altcoin, with position sizes ranging from 10,000 to 100,000 ADA, 250 to 5,000 LINK, and 12,500 to 250,000 XLM.
Futures contracts allow investors to gain price exposure or hedge risk without owning the underlying tokens, and the inclusion of micro contracts suggests that the products are intended to be available to retail traders, subject to broker support.
Martin Franchi, CEO of NinjaTrader, a US retail futures trading platform, said digital assets are reaching a “global inflection point” as they become more integrated into investors’ portfolios, and added that the fresh contracts reflect growing demand from retail investors for regulated cryptocurrency futures and a wider selection of products.
The announcement follows a recent move by CME Group and the Nasdaq Stock Exchange to unify their crypto benchmarks, renaming the Nasdaq Crypto Index to the Nasdaq-CME Crypto Index. The index tracks the price of BTC, ETH, XRP, SOL, LINK, ADA, and Avalanche (AVAX).
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Altcoin futures are slowly entering regulated markets in the US
CME’s decision to add futures contracts tied to the three altcoins comes as the U.S. cryptocurrency futures market remains largely focused around BTC and ETH, with only narrow expansion into contracts tied to other digital assets emerging in 2025.
Coinbase offers CFTC-regulated futures contracts pegged to BTC and ETH through the Coinbase derivatives exchange, which fired in June 2023 for institutional customers before expanding access to smaller, retail-focused customers contracts in May 2025
Kraken, another major U.S.-based exchange, has introduced domestic derivatives platform in July 2025, which allows investors to access cryptocurrency futures contracts listed on CME Group. While the company offers perpetual futures contracts on several altcoins on its global platform, US users are narrow to CME-listed products.
Derivatives exchange Bitnomial has taken a more direct approach to altcoin futures. In March, the company launched CFTC-regulated futures contracts linked to Ripple’s XRP in the US.
On Wednesday, Bitnomial launched the first regulated monthly futures contracts linked to Aptos (APT). Deals are initially available to institutional customers, with retail access expected in the coming weeks.
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