Chicago-based derivatives giant CME Group has urged the holders of XRP ahead of the launch of futures tied to the popular altcoin.
The much-awaited product is expected to go live on May 19.
CME inadvertently revealed its plans to introduce XRP with a beta page on its website. The derivatives giant quickly moved to downplay the leak, claiming that it was merely a mock-up in a test environment.
However, XRP did confirm its intention to launch such a product in April. The official confirmation came shortly after CME introduced Solana futures.
As reported by U.Today, Bitnomial rolled out the very first regulated XRP-based futures in the US back in March.
CME launched pricing indices for the Ripple-linked token last July, which was a significant sign of XRP's growing institutional adoption. Back then, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse clarified that the launch of the benchmark reference rate was the first step toward institutional crypto products.
The launch of XRP futures is considered to be a crucial step before the potential approval of spot-based ETFs tracking the price of the cryptocurrency later this year.
As of now, there are more than a dozen pending applications from such major players as Franklin Templeton and Bitwise.
It remains to be seen how XRP will react to the launch of CME futures. The token is currently trading at $2.56, according to CoinGecko data.
The price of Bitcoin famously peaked in 2018 shortly after the launch of CME's Bitcoin futures. This, of course, does not necessarily mean that XRP is going to suffer the same fate, but there are some concerns about the potential impact of the token on the cryptocurrency's price action.
Vladislav Sopov
Dan Burgin