CME Group revealed record third-quarter revenue, which grew 13% compared to the previous year, reaching $1.7 billion. Its net income increased to $1.037 billion, while the diluted price per share was $908 million a year earlier, while adjusted earnings rose 13% to $3.02. However, the volumes of its micro-cryptocurrency futures were down 46% year-on-year. They amounted to 160,000 contracts per day on average, compared to 297,000.
CME Group reports record Q3 revenue for 2026, achieving double-digit revenue and net income growth.
Full release: https://t.co/u5X8hCIqmj
— CME Group (@CMEGroup) October 21, 2026
The results demonstrated that CME Group’s performance was resilient despite a significant decrease in the trading of its cryptocurrency mini-futures.
The company is one of the leading exchanges providing various financial instruments, including futures and options on interest rates, shares, and cryptocurrencies, which enable investors to hedge their positions or speculate without buying the underlying assets.
Source: cmegroup.com
On a macro level, the company’s average daily volume in the contracts totaled a record of 29.4 million, increasing by 16% compared to the same period last year. The increase was driven by the robustness of interest-rate and equity-index futures.
Moreover, the exchange posted a record-breaking market data fee revenue of $243 million. On the back of the reduced uncertainties on the markets and the demand for hedging, CME Group stated that it has spent almost a billion dollars on buying back shares and paying dividends to its shareholders.
Despite the decrease in volumes of micro-cryptographic futures, CME Group is actively developing this segment and maintaining its growth. In particular, the company announced the introduction of cryptocurrency futures and options in continuous trading from May 29th, which means that clients can trade crypto-products round the clock, except weekends.
As of the end of the third quarter, the number of contracts traded on weekends already exceeded 361,000, with a notional value of $3.7 billion. Moreover, CME Group stated that Bitcoin Cash and Uniswap futures have been introduced on October 19th.
Consequently, the company is successfully creating conditions for trading in cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin futures are available for trading 24 hours a day, excluding weekends, and the selection of available products is growing. Nevertheless, the significant drop in the volumes of micro-crypto futures compared to the same period last year demonstrates that this segment is still growing, but slower than before.
In particular, the average revenue per contract for CME Group dropped to $0.679 from $0.702, and this decrease, compared to the average daily volumes, partly explains the lower-than-expected profits.
Overall, CME Group’s results have shown two different pictures: on the one hand, the volumes of mini-cryptographic futures dropped significantly in the past year. On the other hand, the company is resilient and has increased its revenues by 13% compared to the previous year.
The growth was driven by the record-breaking volumes of contracts in interest rate and equity index. The introduction of new products and extended trading hours makes CME Group more attractive to investors, but it is still too early to say if this will translate into higher volumes and revenues for the company.
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