Galaxy Digital And XBTO Execute 1st Block Trade On Bakkt BTC Futures

The Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), which is the governing body behind the New York Stock exchange, has officially initiated the first block trade of Bakkt’s Bitcoin futures contracts. It was Galaxy Digital and XBTO as the digital assets merchant and crypto investment firm that initiated the first block trade on October 1.

As reports from ICE showed in an official press release, the first Bakkt BTC Futures block trade was carried out in a nice way – and the deal was cleared by agricultural commodities merchant ED&F Man, as the latest crypto news show.

“Last week, we bought the first Bakkt Bitcoin Daily Futures contract and took the first physical delivery of a digital asset under existing commodity futures laws and regulations. This week, we executed the first block trade. We’re pleased to report that the launch was successful and can accommodate large trades,” XBTO stated when talking about the block trade execution.

Now that Galaxy Digital and XBTO are the first organizations doing this, we can safely say that block trades are becoming very popular. For those of you who don’t know or are not following our Bitcoin news, they are privately arranged futures or options transactions which can be executed separately from the public market. As CME Group showed in a report, block trades are often executed by large firms and institutions which have specific purposes in mind.

Bakkt was launched previously this year (on September 23) after more than a year spent ensuring full compliance with the US authorities. The BTC futures contracts platform saw more than 71 traded contracts in the first 24 hours.

Bakkt failed to impress on the first day of trading mainly because of the fact that the currency’s price had been range-bound. Now that Galaxy Digital and XBTO made their first transaction, the situation will likely change.

The day after the Bakkt launch, the Bitcoin price took its largest intraday hit since January, losing more than 13% on Tuesday, September 24. Ever since then, the Bitcoin news updates news show that the dominant cryptocurrency is in a vulnerable position and looks like it is trapped below the $8,500 region.

“The catalyst for today’s plunge, in my mind, seems to be the underwhelming launch of Bakkt. This is a prime example of ‘buy the rumor, sell the news,” said Mati Greenspan at the time of the crash, known as a senior market analyst at the digital asset trading platform eToro.