Bitcoin Rallies; MX2 Options on Track for Launch; MEMX Options Files for Exchange Prediction Contracts
Sep 8, 2026
Bitcoin Rallies; MX2 Options on Track for Launch; MEMX Options Files for Exchange Prediction Contracts
Highlights & Recent Developments
- Equity and options volumes were soft in August, consistent with typical late summer trading patterns
- Bitcoin prices rallied from roughly $63,000 to above $77,000 during the month
- The comment period on the SEC’s proposal to rescind Rule 611 drew more than 300 letters. Read the MEMX letter.
- MX2 Options completed its second UAT on August 29, ahead of our September 14 go-live. Thank you to our members and industry partners for supporting this testing.
- MEMX Options filed a proposal with the SEC for equity-based exchange prediction contracts, which is a new product that allows investors to trade YES or NO on a single question: will an issuer’s reported revenue, earnings or another key financial metric meet or exceed a specified level?
- Blue Ocean Technologies marks two years of operation using MEMX’s market-as-a-service platform. Watch David Mellor’s interview with CEO Brian Hyndman.
Equities Exchange Highlights
August continued the seasonal pattern we’ve seen in past summers: equity CADV came in at 16.4 billion shares, down 6% from July and flat year over year. One noteworthy exception to the quiet month was the price of bitcoin, which climbed from roughly $63,000 early in the month to above $77,000 by month end.
On August 17, the comment period closed on the SEC’s proposal to rescind Rule 611 (the Order Protection Rule) and Rule 610(e) (the Locked and Crossed Markets Rule). The proposal drew a high volume of letters and a wide range of views from exchanges, broker-dealers, and investors, reflecting the rule’s long history as one of the most debated provisions of Regulation NMS. MEMX provided a comment letter.
MEMX Chief Operations Officer, Quito Zuba, as well as Head of Market Structure, Adrian Griffiths will both be participating in the SEC's roundtable to discuss 24-hour trading on September 17. The full list of panelists and planned agenda can be found here. Discussions will focus on how to evolve regulatory safeguards and industry standards to prepare for around the clock trading.
Options Exchange Highlights
MX2 Options is on track for its September 14 launch. We successfully completed our second of three User Acceptance Tests (UAT) on August 29, connecting to OCC and OPRA from production infrastructure alongside a number of participating members. The final pre-launch test is September 12. Thank you to everyone who has supported connectivity testing so far. We look forward to going live and sharing more once trading begins.
Options activity followed a similar seasonal pattern to equities. August ADV came in at 62.8 million contracts, down 2.5% from July, though still up 14.4% year-over-year and consistent with the steady growth trend we’ve highlighted in prior months.
MEMX Equities Based Exchange Prediction Contracts
On August 12, MEMX filed a proposed rule change to list Equities Based Exchange Prediction Contracts (“EPCs”) on MEMX Options. MEMX’s EPCs are event contracts on publicly traded companies designed to provide investors with targeted exposure to objective, quantifiable measures of a company’s financial performance, including earnings, revenue, sales and other key issuer-specific metrics. The new product is designed to let investors trade directly on the financial outcomes that matter most, providing a straightforward way to manage risk around company announcements or to express a more targeted view on individual stocks.
Subject to regulatory review, members will be able to trade complementary pairs of YES and NO contracts with prices ranging from $0.01 to $0.99. Such YES and NO contracts will trade together in a single market, provided orders for both sides of the transaction sum to $1 per contract. At expiration, the successful side of the transaction will receive a binary payout of $1 per contract. All transactions will be resolved based on definitive data included in the issuer’s periodic SEC reports, such as its Form 10-K or 10-Q.
Because prices range from $0.01 to $0.99, the contract price will also function as the market’s real-time implied probability of the outcome. For example, a YES contract on NVDA Q4 earnings trading at $0.60 per contract reflects a 60% confidence that NVDA’s Q4 earnings will either meet or exceed the specified earnings threshold. In turn, the corresponding NO contract executed at $0.40 per contract implies a 40% confidence that NVDA will miss the target earnings level.
Comments on MEMX’s EPC proposal are due by September 17, 2026, and can be submitted here.
Market Technology
MEMX Head of Market Technology David Mellor sat down with Blue Ocean CEO Brian Hyndman to commemorate the exchange’s second anniversary. Hear how Blue Ocean is leveraging MEMX's market-as-a service platform and technology to fuel rapid growth and pioneer round-the-clock trading.
