CME building bitcoin benchmarks with London tech firm
Derivatives exchange CME Group plans to launch two bitcoin benchmarks later this year with London-based tech firm Crypto Facilities.
The pair are working on CME CF Bitcoin Reference Rate (BRR) - which will provide a final bitcoin settlement price in US dollars at 4pm London time on each trading day
Another benchmark dubbed CME CF Bitcoin Real Time Index (RTI) is also in the pipeline and will allow users real-time access to bitcoin prices.
Both are set to go live in the final quarter of 2016.
Prices will be derived from six different bitcoin exchanges – Bitfinex, Bitstamp, Coinbase, Genesis Global Trading, itBit and Kraken.
The RTI will be calculated by Crypto Facilities and will be based on global demand to buy and sell bitcoin aggregated into a consolidated order book.
It will reflect the current market price of bitcoin in US dollar terms and will be published once every second.
"These products are designed to allow bitcoin traders, companies and other users to rely on a credible reference rate price source," said Sandra Ro, CME's executive director and digitization lead.
"The availability of robust reference prices with independent oversight is key to the professionalization of bitcoin trading and further establishes digital assets as a new asset class," added Timo Schlaefer, Crypto Facilities.
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