CME Group to launch computing power futures market
CME Group Inc. (NASDAQ: CME) announced plans to launch a futures market for computing power in partnership with Silicon Data, pending regulatory approval. The new contracts will be based on Silicon Data's daily GPU benchmarks for on-demand rental rates.
The futures market will allow traders, financial institutions, AI companies and cloud service providers to manage price volatility in the computing market. Silicon Data, backed by trading firm DRW, provides GPU market intelligence and benchmarking services.
CME Group described the planned futures contracts as first-in-class for the compute market. The launch is scheduled for later this year, subject to regulatory review.
The announcement comes as demand for computing power has increased with the growth of artificial intelligence applications. The futures contracts will use Silicon Data's indices as the underlying benchmark for pricing.