ICE Rolls Out CoinDesk Crypto Futures, Targets DeFi Borrowing Rates Next
HONG KONG — Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange, has begun trading a new lineup of cryptocurrency futures tied to CoinDesk indices, with additional plans to introduce derivatives linked to onchain lending rates.
The contracts went live Monday, following their announcement on Jan. 9. The suite includes cash-settled, U.S. dollar-denominated futures referencing seven CoinDesk benchmarks.
Among them are broad-market contracts tracking the CoinDesk 20 and CoinDesk 5 indices, alongside single-asset futures tied to bitcoin, ether, solana, XRP and BNB. By settling in cash instead of requiring token delivery, the products are designed to provide institutions with streamlined exposure to crypto prices without the custody and operational hurdles of holding digital assets directly.
Next on ICE’s roadmap is the proposed listing of One Month CoinDesk Overnight Rates (CDOR) USDC futures, pending regulatory approval. According to the companies, these contracts would track the annualized effective interest rate paid by borrowers in decentralized finance (DeFi) markets.
The planned rate futures would effectively translate onchain borrowing costs into a regulated derivatives framework, similar to how traditional markets use benchmarks such as the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (SOFR) to price loans and other dollar-based instruments.
By expanding into rate-based products, ICE aims to deepen crypto derivatives markets beyond directional price trades, enabling participants to hedge or speculate on funding costs and liquidity conditions across digital asset ecosystems.
ICE also highlighted the growing influence of CoinDesk’s index suite, noting that tens of billions of dollars are benchmarked to the indices. The CoinDesk 20, constructed using a capped market-cap-weighted methodology, is designed to capture a significant share of the broader digital asset market.
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