Wall Street banks are refusing to let their customers purchase Bitcoin Futures according to a report by the Wall Street Journal.
If you want to trade Bitcoin Futures you will need a licensed and registered bank like Chicago Merc (CME), Chicago Board (Cboe), Nasdaq, and Cantor Fitzgerald who have stated they will support Bitcoin Futures in the coming days, weeks, and months ahead. Because the gatekeepers at Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BAML), Citigroup Inc. (Citi), JP Morgan Chase and Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) say they’re “refusing” to list the futures for customers.
According to a letter from the Futures Industry Association, the main futures industry lobby group whose members include the largest Wall Street banks, to the CFTC, the introduction of bitcoin futures “did not allow for proper public transparency and input”.
“It is also our understanding that not all risk committees of the relevant exchanges were consulted before the certification to launch these products,” the letter added.
While other brokerage firms like Goldman Sachs are clearing some of its clients for trading Bitcoin futures limiting the futures exposure, Bussiness Insider reported.
“Goldman is still exploring whether to play a role in other aspects of cryptocurrencies such as market making, Goldman will decide who gets to trade bitcoin futures on a case-by-case basis, a source told Business Insider.”
Goldman Sachs is the biggest futures broker in the United States according to Greenwhich.
Another reason for cryptocurrency enthusiasts to be smug is because “Interactive Brokers Group Inc. will offer customers access to Cboe’s bitcoin futures, but only for so-called ‘long’ traders betting on a bitcoin price increase, Chief Executive Thomas Peterffy said in an email,” The Reporter noted.
As we get closer and closer to a foreseeable reality without central bankers and bankers with a total market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies nearing 500 billion dollars the bankers who see cryptopia doesn’t include them will continue to panic.
As Bank of Commerce President Alex O’Brien commented on bitcoin earlier this year they are scared that cryptocurrency will make them obsolete and not needed.
“I’m scared for the banking industry because I think that Bitcoin and Litecoin, the concepts behind them and the way the blockchain works, is something that could knock banks out of the game,” O’Brien said.
As a fun fact and a reminder Thomas Peterffy is already known for his hate of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. Peterffy took out an ad in the Wall Street Journal to warn regulators about bitcoin futures last month to request the Commodity Futures Trading Commission [CFTC] “require any clearing organization that wishes to clear any cryptocurrency or derivative do so in a separate clearing system isolated from other products,” he wrote.
The planned launch in the next week of futures contracts by the Chicago exchanges CME Group and today’s launch of CBOE Global Markets will be very interesting to keep an eye on as Bitcoin and on some brokerages, even Bitcoin Cash, face mainstream adoption. Will it stifle the volatility? Additionally, another Bitcoin futures exchange is planned by LedgerX which has already been approved and regulated by the U.S. Commodities and Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).
This next week’s launch will ultimately determine what to expect when the National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (Nasdaq) and Cantor Fitzgerald LP list Bitcoin derivatives on their own exchanges next year.
How will institutional investors money drive the Bitcoin price? This is history in the making for the cryptosphere. So far the market has reacted negatively losing a value of [FIAT: $4,000.]
Bitcoin is currently trading at [FIAT: $13,758.70] down from an earlier value in the week of [FIAT: $18,000] or a loss of (-$4,242) while alts are for the most part all in the red according to Coin Market Cap at the time of this report.
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