Volume trading on institutional derivatives plummeted following the crypto market crash in March.
According to the CryptoCompare March 2020 Exchange Review, institutional derivatives volumes tanked following the market crash on Mar. 12, which saw the price of bitcoin drop as low as $3,800. Trading volume across institutional exchanges, including CME, declined more than 43% in March compared to the month before.
According to the report,
Institutional appetite for derivatives products appeared to decline rapidly following the BTC crash, with CME losing 44% of volume compared to February. Trading volumes totalled $7.36bn in March compared to $13.1bn in February.
Volume trading across crypto exchanges in March 2020 | Source: CryptoCompare
The report found that CME options trading, which launched in January of this year, have not seen significant improvements in volume and are far from generating the activity seen on rival crypto exchange Deribit.
Despite the market crash, Mar 13. brought about the highest daily volumes in cryptocurrency history, generating $75.9bn in trades. Lower Tier exchanges accounted for the majority of the volume at $54.3bn, while Top Tier volumes also set a record at $21.6bn in daily trades.
According to the report, spot volumes surged in Q1 2020, with Top Tier exchanges increasing month-on-month since December 2019. Even with the economic uncertainty of the coronavirus, spot volumes for Top Tier exchanges increased 35% on average vs February.
While crypto experienced its single largest day of volume trading, March’s overall volume failed to reach the same levels of Dec. 2017’s crypto bull run.
The report reads,
Despite the March price crash, volume levels for these exchanges still haven’t reached those seen in the Dec-2017 bull run. Overall, volumes across all Top Tier exchanges increased 8.0% to $288Bn in March.
Binance was the largest Top Tier exchange by volume in March, trading $63.6bn, an increase of 19.2% over the month before. OKEx generated the second-largest volume of $47.7 bn, down 8.2% from February. Coinbase experienced the largest percent increase in volume trading during March, generating $13.3bn, up 41.9%.
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