On Sunday evening, Bitcoin prices surged as soon as the Cboe Futures Exchange commenced trading futures on the digital currency. The Cboe exchange rolled out the futures under the stock ticker symbol ‘XBT’.

As of 6 p.m. New York time, bitcoin was at $14,890 and then proceeded to jump to $15,500.13 as of 7:17 p.m. on the Coinbase exchange.

In early trading on the Cboe, the new futures were at $15,860, which is up 2.6%. Even though things turned sour around 7 p.m. New York time, the digital currency quickly made a comeback.

Here’s what JJ Kinahan, chief market strategist at TD Ameritrade, had to say about Sunday’s news:

“So far, trading has been smooth. I think that was the biggest worry for people. We’ve been trading for about an hour and more than 700 contracts have been traded. So, I’d say this is a successful launch.”

Up until this point bitcoin had been primarily owned and traded by entrepreneurs, but now, the launch allows for institutional investors to buy into the digital currency space.

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