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Mastercard has announced it is preparing to integrate cryptocurrencies into its loyalty program offerings for United States-based banks, merchants and fintech firms on its payment network. It would be working with digital asset platform Bakkt to allow its customers based in the United States to buy, sell and hold digital assets through custodial wallets. The partnership will also enable cardholders to earn and spend rewards in crypto rather than using loyalty points and accruing or redeeming tokens for purchases.

Bakkt is seeking a license to operate as a trust, while LedgerX went the route of DCM and DCO licenses, which some have said means its contracts are likely to be fully collateralized, so traders can't legally trade them on margin.

The lion's share of Bitcoin derivatives trading volume is on unregulated exchanges that don't operate as clearinghouses and offer leverage up to 100X.

Customers will have a $3,900 deposit requirement for both Bakkt's daily and monthly futures contracts as an initial hedge. The speculative initial requirements will be somewhat higher, at $4,290 each.

Intercontinental Exchange Inc. is closer to offering Bitcoin futures trading as its Bakkt unit opened its digital-asset custody warehouse to customers. Here are the nuts and bolts of how it will work.

"A "safe harbor" that made it more difficult for retail investors to distinguish bona fide projects like Blockstack from known scams like OneCoin for a three-year period would likely undo much of the progress towards mainstreaming crypto adoption that has been made to date, which has seen large institutional players like Bakkt or Fidelity Digital Assets enter the space."

According to the latest data from market analysis company Skew, total open interest in Bitcoin options passed $1.5 billion on June 9. This comes barely a month after open interest crossed $1 billion for the first time, marking a 50% increase in just 33 days. Deribit has open interest of $1.1 billion, and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange $368 million. LedgerX open interest remained roughly the same since May 7 at $52 million while OKEx saw a 15% fall to $65 million. Bakkt also saw a fall in open interest, from $80,000 to $68,000.

Intercontinental Exchange Inc. said Monday that it will begin testing its consumer app for digital assets with its partner Starbucks Inc. in the first half of 2020.

Bakkt's bitcoin core futures contract saw saw 2,728 contracts traded ($20 million) and $1.75 million in open interest outpacing the record of 1,179 contracts on October 25, as the spot market price of BTC plummeted under $7,000 on November 22.