Retail broker Hantec Markets announced on Tuesday morning that it has launched 24/7 trading in crypto CFDs.
The broker said that the launch went live at the start of this month and it has already seen a “surge” in trading volumes on the back of that.
“With the maturing of crypto as a tradable asset class, clients increasingly expect institutional-grade access to these markets on a continuous basis,” said Norayr Djerrahian, Chief Strategy Officer at Hantec Markets.
“The uptake we’ve seen since launching 24/7 crypto trading confirms that demand. This is a strategic step forward in our mission to deliver flexible, global trading infrastructure.”
Crypto prices have seen huge volatility since the start of the year. Bitcoin was down 20% against the dollar in the year to April 9th. Since then it has surged by almost 40% and has risen above the $100k price mark.
Crypto CFDs can end up being a sizeable proportion of overall revenues for brokers, although they can also have the same problem as equities. Clients can be omnidirectional in their activity, meaning brokers are less able to capture spread.
Nonetheless, last year XTB saw close to 15% of overall revenues derived from crypto CFDs. That was up from 10.1% the year prior. What’s particularly interesting about that is that leverage is limited to 2:1 in the European Union, which is where the broker does most of its business.