Bitcoin leapt a eye-watering $2,000 on Monday after investors flocked to Chicago’s Cboe futures exchange to bet on price movements.
The digital currency was seen trading at a spot price of $16,574.12 at 6:36 a.m. ET, according to data on industry website CoinDesk, whose Bitcoin Price Index tracks prices from crypto exchanges Bitstamp, Coinbase and Bitfinex. It was up 10.22 percent for the session.
Trading at $14,557.07 just a minute before the introduction of Cboe’s hotly anticipated futures contracts, bitcoin’s price saw an immediate hike in value of more than $1,000 in the first five to 10 minutes of trading.
Bitcoin futures, meanwhile, were trading at $17,690, up more than 14 percent for the session.
Futures contracts allow investors to agree to buy or sell a particular asset at a predetermined price at a later date. This enables price movement speculation and the avoidance of volatility in the market.
Bitcoin’s total market capitalization — which is calculated by multiplying the price by the volume of tokens in circulation — stood at $277 billion, higher than that of U.S. banking giant Citigroup’s.
