A total of 77 contracts have been launched: 55 standard-sized futures, each representing 100 shares of the underlying company, and 22 micro-sized contracts, each covering 10 shares. According to CME Group's own statement, the lineup includes mega-cap technology companies like Alphabet, Meta, and Tesla, as well as the recently listed SpaceX, plus widely known companies such as Micron, Pfizer, and Walmart.
All contracts are cash-settled based on the closing price of the underlying stock and have a quarterly expiration structure similar to CME's existing equity index futures. Tim McCourt, CME Group's Global Head of Equities, Foreign Exchange, and Alternative Products, stated that the launch responds to demand from traders, noting:
"Clients want to manage the risk of stock price changes with greater precision and take advantage of the centralized market's capital efficiency."
He added that this product aims to expand CME's client base beyond the traditional institutional audience, telling reporters that these contracts "have the potential to bring a large number of new traders into our ecosystem." CME stated it is collaborating with over 35 retail brokerage firms to provide access to these contracts alongside its usual institutional channels.
Built for 24/7 Access
Single-stock futures trading runs for approximately 23 hours a day, five days a week, on the CME Globex platform, which is significantly longer than the standard U.S. stock exchange hours of 9:30 AM to 4:00 PM Eastern Time. This structure allows traders to react to earnings reports, macroeconomic data, or geopolitical news immediately upon release, rather than waiting for the market to open.
However, this flexibility comes with its own risks: Matt Cashman, Head of Investor Education at Options Clearing Corp, warns that liquidity can thin out overnight. Cashman noted that trading outside regular hours, "including the first minutes after a company releases earnings, can be volatile"—a warning that echoes existing concerns about sparse order books on CME's 24/7 cryptocurrency markets.
Unlike commission-free stock and options trading apps that rely on payment for order flow, futures traders typically pay a fee per single-stock futures contract they trade.
Single-stock futures are not new to the U.S., but they have a turbulent history. The OneChicago exchange, jointly owned by CME Group, Cboe Global Markets, and Interactive Brokers, traded security futures for nearly two decades before shutting down in September 2020, citing low demand.
A Bridge to CME's Cryptocurrency Derivatives Business
Notably, the new contracts exclude any crypto tokens or digital assets, but they operate on the infrastructure that CME has refined over years through its cryptocurrency business—namely, cash-settled and margin-based products that allow traders to open leveraged positions without the need to custody fast-moving assets. CME launched bitcoin futures as early as 2017 and has since built the nation's largest regulated market for digital asset derivatives.
In 2026, this arm of its crypto business continued to expand: on May 29, CME Group launched 24/7 trading of bitcoin and ether futures and options, clearing over 7,200 contracts worth about $50 million in the first weekend alone.
Since then, the company has added futures on cryptocurrency indexes tracking Bitcoin, Solana, and XRP, and even planned to launch bitcoin volatility futures. However, activity in CME's Bitcoin derivatives market has declined from peak levels: on April 11, open interest in CME's bitcoin futures fell to $8.41 billion, a 14-month low (as annualized yields on spreads narrowed from the 15–20% range to around 5%, and daily trading volume dipped below $3 billion).
