BitMEX to Add Dogecoin Perpetual Contracts After Retail Investors Take DOGE to New All-Time High

Cryptocurrency derivatives trading platform BitMEX has announced it’s launching Dogecoin (DOGE) perpetual swap contracts, allowing traders and investors to speculate on the price of the cryptocurrency.

Dogecoin was created as a meme, and uses the Shiba Inu dog breed as its mascot. The cryptocurrency’s community is well-known for taking on philanthropic projects, which included helping charitable organizations. The Dogecoin community made headlines in 2014 after raising more than $25,000 worth of DOGE to let the Jamaican bobsleigh team attend the Winter Olympics in Sochi.

BitMEX is adding the perpetual swap contracts after DOGE hit a new all-time high this year thanks to a retail investor-fueled surge that was meant to help one DOGE trade at $1. The cryptocurrency briefly traded above $0.05 before dropping. It’s now trading at $0.032.

In its blog post, BitMEX wrote:

In retrospect, it was inevitable. As the surge in interest in Dogecoin continues, we are launching a DOGEUSDT perpetual swap contract with up to 20x leverage this Friday.

The post’s opening references Elon Musk’s “it was inevitable” tweet, which is widely believed to be referring to bitcoin as the CEO of Tesla changed his Twitter bio to “#Bitcoin” at the time the tweet was published. Shortly after Musk revealed he is a bitcoin supporter.

BitMEX’s contracts will be based on the underlying bitcoin equivalent of the DOGE/USDT trading pairs on other cryptocurrency trading platforms. On the derivatives exchange, users deposit BTC and can trade several contracts using the cryptocurrency, with profits and loss being denominated in BTC.

The new contracts see BitMEX move in on trading volume other cryptocurrency exchanges were seeing on Dogecoin derivatives, including perpetual swaps-. BitMEX has been losing trading volume since the  U.S Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) announced that it had brought charges against “five entities and three individuals” that own and operate the crypto derivatives exchange BitMEX” in October 2020.

Featured image via Pixabay.