Key Takeaways:
CME Group rolled out 4 new futures contracts tied to Avalanche and Sui, extending Wall Street's regulated crypto derivatives deeper into the high-throughput layer-1 sector as the exchange prepares to shift to near-24/7 trading on May 29.
"These contracts allow market participants to diversify beyond benchmark assets like bitcoin and ether," CME Group said in launch materials. "By trading alongside our established Cryptocurrency suite, Avalanche and Sui futures offer potential margin offsets, requiring a lower initial outlay than the spot market."
The new listings include AVAX futures sized at 5,000 tokens and Micro AVAX at 500 tokens, alongside SUI futures at 50,000 tokens and Micro SUI at 5,000 tokens. All 4 contracts are cash-settled against their respective CME CF Reference Rates and cleared through CME's existing infrastructure, eliminating the need for physical token custody. First block trades were executed by digital-asset specialists FalconX and G-20 Group in early May, according to market participants.
The expansion comes as CME's cryptocurrency suite posted record activity. Average daily open interest reached 313,900 contracts in the first quarter of 2026, up 25% from a year earlier. The exchange's crypto futures and options notional volume approached $3 trillion in 2025, driven by institutional demand for regulated derivatives beyond the bitcoin-ether duopoly. CME's February launch of Cardano, Chainlink and Stellar futures set the stage for the AVAX and SUI listings, with those contracts posting average daily volumes of 111, 94 and 61 contracts respectively in Q1.
Correlation data shows room for diversification
Avalanche and Sui occupy distinct positions in the risk-return spectrum relative to established crypto assets, according to CME's analysis of daily returns since May 2023. AVAX shows a 0.70 correlation with bitcoin and 0.75 with both Solana and Cardano, reflecting its positioning among smart-contract platforms. SUI displays lower correlations across the board, including 0.61 with bitcoin and 0.49 with XRP, suggesting greater idiosyncratic risk.
On the risk-reward chart covering 2020 to 2026, AVAX exhibits the highest annualized volatility among the group with more modest historical returns, while SUI shows high volatility alongside negative historical returns reflective of its shorter market history. Bitcoin occupies the lowest position on the risk spectrum, with ether serving as a midpoint.
Trading strategies and forward outlook
CME pitched the contracts as tools for relative-value and inter-commodity spreads, allowing traders to pair AVAX or SUI futures against Solana or against bitcoin and ether to isolate specific architectural risks. The centrally cleared, cash-settled structure also supports basis trading, capturing the spread between spot prices and the futures curve.
The launch coincides with CME's broader push into round-the-clock crypto trading. Starting May 29, the exchange's cryptocurrency futures and options will trade continuously on CME Globex and CME ClearPort, with only brief daily maintenance windows and a 2-hour window on Saturdays. The shift eliminates the structural weekend gap that previously left institutional investors unable to hedge positions during periods of high spot-market volatility.
As capital allocation broadens across high-throughput layer-1 protocols, the new contracts equip traders with capital efficiency and transparent price discovery in a regulated framework, enabling more precise exposure management across an increasingly diverse cryptocurrency landscape.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.
