Crypto futures volume soars in Russia amid Bitcoin market volatility

Trading volumes of Russian crypto futures have reached record high levels amid the major correction on global markets for digital assets.

Some derivatives on Moscow Exchange, the country’s largest stock market, have seen growth exceeding 700% while Bitcoin lost 30% of its value in about a week.

Moscow Exchange registers record volumes of Bitcoin futures traded

Spot crypto markets experienced a significant correction in the past week or so, with major coins hitting lows unseen for well over a year, since October 2024.

The price of the cryptocurrency with the biggest market capitalization dropped by nearly a third between the last days of January and the first week of February 2026.

At its lowest point so far this year, Bitcoin (BTC) approached the $60,000 mark before bouncing back to around $68,000 at the time of writing, still a staggering contrast with the latest all-time high of over $125,000 from October 2025. The price of Ethereum, the second-largest coin, tumbled more than 40%.

Against this backdrop, Russia’s nascent market for crypto-based derivative products saw a major spike in activity, the business news outlet RBC noted in a report, drawing attention to the latest figures registered on the country’s leading platform for such instruments.

Trading volume for the Moscow Exchange Bitcoin Index futures, set to expire this month, jumped by 434%, from a little over 380.3 million rubles (over $4.9 million) on January 28 to 2.03 billion rubles (almost $30 million) on February 5.

Trades surged, too, from 8,400 to 42,800 (more than 400%). Both indicators are at record highs since the launch of this contract, the Russian portal’s Investments page emphasized.

Meanwhile, trading of the futures on the shares of BlackRock’s IBIT Trust ETF, which will expire in March, went up by 246%, from 590 million to 2.05 billion rubles, its highest volume to date.

The MOEX Ethereum Index futures, expiring this month, saw their trading volume reach 467.5 million rubles (over $6 million), an almost 730% increase from last Wednesday’s 56.4 million, with the number of trades growing from 3,000 to 22,300, the article detailed.

And the trading volume for the futures contract on the iShares Ethereum Trust ETF (ETHA), with March expiry, increased by 178%, from 105 million rubles on January 28 to 291.5 million in Russian fiat, or close to $3.8 million, this past Thursday. Trades shot up by 400% plus, from 2,000 to 10,600.

Commenting on these figures, the Managing Director of Derivatives Markets at Moscow Exchange, Maria Patrikeeva, highlighted:

She further pointed out that the total volume of open positions in BTC and ETH derivatives reached 9.3 billion Russian rubles, with the exchange registering a movement towards new index contracts whose quotes correspond to the prices of the two leading cryptocurrencies.

Russia’s crypto derivatives market expands ahead of full regulation

The MOEX executive emphasized that the crypto-based instruments not only allow investors to participate in the price movement of the digital assets, but also give them a chance to hedge their positions.

Russian derivatives based on cryptocurrencies have traded since last spring, when the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) authorized financial firms to launch such products on the domestic market in late May 2025.

They have been exclusively offered to “highly qualified” investors, but this is likely to change this year. The latest regulatory concept released by the monetary authority in December aims to expand investor access, as part of comprehensive regulations to be adopted by July 1, as reported by Cryptopolitan.

The new for Russia category of instruments, including securities and other digital financial assets (DFAs) linked to the value of cryptocurrencies, are usually denominated in U.S. dollars, settled in Russian rubles, and must not involve the actual delivery of the underlying cryptocurrency.

MOEX was among the first traditional players to enter the promising market, followed by Russia’s second-largest stock exchange, the St. Petersburg Exchange (SPB). The CBR already indicated it will rely on such pillars of Russia’s existing financial infrastructure to facilitate crypto trading in the future.

Russian analysts approached by RBC gave their two cents on the latest market developments. According to Dmitry Vishnevsky from Cifra Broker, the increased activity on MOEX results mainly from BTC volatility on global markets.

Andrey Varnavsky, director of digital assets at Ingosstrakh Investments, believes, however, that the Russian futures volumes are largely driven by domestic demand. He is also convinced that turnover would be much higher if actual crypto assets were traded.