Bitcoin futures exchange Bakkt hit a new all-time high on Wednesday as its trading volume soared by nearly 800% over the previous day.
In all, 224 Bitcoin contracts were traded for 1 BTC each and are worth an estimated US$1.9 million [AU$2.8 million] at current prices.
This marks a 796% increase over the previous day, when the exchange posted a dismal traded volume of just 25 BTC.
https://twitter.com/BakktBot/status/1182201604990230530
Bakkt’s lukewarm launch
Despite the hype that built up around the launch of the first physically-settled Bitcoin futures exchange, Bakkt’s trading volumes were underwhelming out of the gate, leading some members of the crypto community to question the interest of institutional investors.
Behold, the great promise of Bakkt, institutional investors are lining up to invest in BTC!
All the BTC influencers were right, BTC to 200k$!Oh sorry…..my mistake, I misread the Bakkt Bot… https://t.co/8YVEFsQEyp
— oudekaas (@oudekaas3) October 3, 2019
On its first day, Bakkt traded just 72 BTC and although that figure more than doubled the following day, the numbers fell far short of expectations.
According to data compiled by @BakktBot, the first week trading volumes on the platform were as follows:
Trading on the platform didn’t improve going into October, in fact, they got worse, with volumes stagnating around 50 BTC for much of last week.
At press time, 94 contracts have been traded so far today, with the last one trading at $8,587.50.
It remains to be seen whether Wednesday’s spike was merely an outlier or a sign of things to come.
Did Bitcoin prices affect Bakkt volumes or vice versa?
The surge in Bakkt’s trading volume is likely due in large part to a corresponding jump in the price of Bitcoin.
Following a slow decline from $8,179 to $7,923 over the weekend, Bitcoin is once again showing signs of life with not one, but two $400+ price jumps in as many days.
On Monday the price of Bitcoin jumped more than $416 – from $7,911 to $8,327 – over the course of the day.
This was followed by a second, larger jump on Tuesday when Bitcoin climbed from $8,196 to $8,625 in just five hours – a gain of $429.
Bitcoin is currently trading at around $8,552 according to CoinMarketCap.