One of the globe’s largest derivatives exchanges, , has formed a partnership with the US-based cryptocurrency trading platform to launch an Ether Real Time Index and Ether Reference Rate, that will offer real-time ether price in USD and a daily benchmark price.
Today we're launching the CME CF -Dollar Reference Rate and Real-Time Index.
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— CMEGroup (@CMEGroup)
“The Ether Reference Rate and Real Time Index are designed to meet the evolving needs of this marketplace,” Tim McCourt, Managing Director and Global Head of Equity Products and Alternative Investments at CME Group, said in a . “Providing price transparency and a credible price reference source is a key development for users of Ethereum.”
Prices will be calculated by the Crypto Facilities exchange and will be based on transactions and order book data from such major trading platforms as Kraken and Bitstamp. Both Ether Reference Rate and Ether Real Time Index are currently available on CME Group and Crypto Facilities websites and are set to launch on the CME Group Market Data Platform on June 4.
“Ether, the second largest cryptocurrency, experienced incredible adoption and growth in 2017, evolving into the leading blockchain for smart contracts,” said Timo Schlaefer, CEO of Crypto Facilities. “We are excited to be contributing to the strong community that has developed around the Ethereum network by providing a reliable reference rate and real-time Ether-Dollar price.”
The new rates will be monitored by the bitcoin Oversight Committee, which will consist of Crypto Facilities, CME Group, as well as other cryptocurrency experts. They will “regularly review the methodology, practices and standards” in order to ensure the integrity of the reference rates.
The news follows last week’s by Crypto Facilities that it was launching the first regulated ethereum futures contracts on its platform. According to Schlaefer, these futures will help to provide more liquidity to the ethereum token, which is currently the largest digital currency after bitcoin. Unlike trading with actual tokens, the new contracts will be regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), what eliminates any regulatory or custodial risks.
“bitcoin has gone through a process of maturation as a financial asset with a futures market in the past year. And Ethereum is following a similar path this year,” said Schlaefer.
As we previously , the futures contracts for bitcoin were created by CME Group in late December, a year after the CME CF bitcoin Reference Rate (BRR) and the CME CF bitcoin Real Time Index (BRTI).
CME Group, based in Chicago, is the world’s major derivatives marketplace, processing 3 billion contracts estimated at nearly $1 quadrillion annually. It is now one of the most diverse marketplaces, offering a wide range of benchmark products across all major asset classes.
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The Swift international transfer system has definitely earned the trust of banking institutions all over the world. The technology that came into existence over 40 years ago revolutionized the international money transfers: it set the new standards for security and speed of transactions. It is not losing the popularity over years: in March 2018, SWIFT of 30.74 million FIN messages per day.
The banking sphere is experiencing a new revolution as blockchain is gaining more and more popularity. The new accomplishment is the usage of bitcoin for handling international loans – available for the clients of German online bank Bitbond.
was founded in 2013, the financial institution is a global marketplace lending platform for small business loans. The total loan volume of Bitbond exceeds $10 million. The company has solid experience of working with blockchain and has decided to continue its development with the new approach to international transactions. The bank is mostly working with small business.
The money transfer via the new system is using bitcoin’s blockchain; however, the loan amount is held in the cryptocurrency not longer than a few minutes. After that it is exchanged back into the necessary currency. This implementation eliminates the risks associated with the high volatility of cryptocurrencies.
German businessman and founder of Bitbond Radoslav Albrecht explained the advantages of the new service: “Traditional money transfers are relatively costly due to currency exchange fees, and can take up to a few days. With Bitbond, payments work independently of where customers are. Via internet it is very, very quick and the fees are low.”
Indeed, SWIFT is a reliable technology but it leaves room for perfection. First of all, SWIFT does not enable the money transfers. The system is just providing a secure way to communicate about payment orders. Secondly, each transaction includes various fees: both for the correspondent and recipient banks, let alone currency exchange rates. Thirdly, the transaction time of traditional SWIFT money transfers is far from instant payments.
The new blockchain-based solution by Bitbond is reducing transaction costs and increases their speed while enabling the high level of security. These features mostly deal with the technical side of the project. But the key factor that may attract clients to Bitbond is the possibility to process payments irrespective of the client’s physical location.
Nevertheless, the SWIFT network is not going to give up in this competition. Its seems to be promising – and the whole system enjoys the benefits of being a credible partner. The high demand of the system gives to it lots of opportunities which Bitbond may lack. For example, the testing of SWIFT’s blockchain proof of concept, which is a part of gpi, i.
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CEO of SharesPost Digital Securities John Wu said, “This is a landmark moment for SharesPost. We saw a need from our investors to expand their portfolios by having the opportunity to participate in Initial Coin Offerings and trade tokenized securities. The ATS approval allows SharesPost to be one of the first companies to operate in this capacity. We are excited to have the green light from the SEC to grow this new arm of our service.
SharesPost has been a pioneer in the private capital markets for nearly a decade, offering new opportunities to investors and businesses who are unable to leverage traditional IPO and equities markets. Now, with the launch of the SharesPost Digital Securities Group the company is adapting its existing ATS and proven transaction capabilities in unregistered securities to the quickly emerging security token market. The platform will also provide investors with the digital custody capability of SharesPost’s Private Brokerage Account, as well as investment research and transaction data on leading token issuers.
“The progression of secondary markets for equities from an entrenched financial product to innovative platforms is happening faster than investors and regulators have anticipated,” said SharesPost CEO Greg Brogger. “SharesPost Financial, our broker-dealer, is one of the first broker-dealers the SEC has cleared for approval in this emerging space. This is a significant milestone for SharesPost as we expand into a tokenized world, bringing our industry expertise to the burgeoning security token market.”
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission official approval of SharesPost’s Alternative System Trading License (ATS) for security tokens is dated to April 16, 2018, and is effective unless noted otherwise.
About SharesPost:
SharesPost’s mission is to create liquidity for the private growth asset class. In 2009, SharesPost launched the first online secondary market for private technology company shares. Since then, SharesPost has connected thousands of buyers and sellers in more than $4 billion worth of transactions in the shares of more than 200 leading technology companies.
The SharesPost platform now also enables clients to access a variety of private market investment and liquidity solutions including (i) research and data on leading private technology companies, (ii) the SharesPost Private Growth Index, (iii) the SharesPost100 Fund, a registered mutual fund providing all investors with easy access to the asset class, and (iv) SharesPost Lending, which enables private company shareholders to borrow against their shares. In 2017, SharesPost managed its first Initial Coin Offering and in 2018 announced plans to integrate trading of digital securities into the SharesPost platform.
SharesPost is a FINRA-registered broker-dealer, SEC registered Alternative Trading System and Registered Investment Advisor.
