coindesk.com
Binance Futures, the derivatives arm of the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume, will launch silver perpetual contracts on Wednesday, enabling crypto traders to place leveraged bets on 2025's standout precious metal.
Perpetual futures contracts, or "perps," are derivative instruments that let traders bet on an asset's price without owning it and without expiration dates, using funding rates, typically every few hours, to keep prices aligned with spot markets. Their endless duration, high leverage options, and 24/7 access have made them wildly popular in crypto, generating billions in daily trading volume across exchanges.
The contract, launching at 10:00 UTC, offers up to 50x leverage on silver priced in U.S. dollars per troy ounce, allowing traders to control positions 50 times larger than their deposited margin and amplifying both gains and losses.
It's margined and settled in tether USDT$0.9990, the world's largest dollar-pegged stablecoin, with a minimum notional value of 5 USDT, the exchange said in an official announcement. Trading these perpetual futures will attract a funding fee, capped at ±2%, every four hours.
The impending launch comes weeks after the exchange debuted perpetuals tied to gold and shows that crypto traders are increasingly diversifying into precious metals, which outperformed the crypto market by leaps and bounds last year.
Silver chalked out a staggering 147% rally in 2025, hitting a record per ounce price of $83.75 at one point. As of writing, it changed hands at $79.84. Gold surged by more than 64% to $4,317, while bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency by market value, ended the year down by more than 5%.
Both precious metals drew strength from fiscal and inflation concerns, with silver gaining extra momentum from surging demand in solar panels and electronics.
The silver contract will be available for futures copy trading within 24 hours of launch, Binance said in the announcement. Multi-assets mode will also let traders use cryptocurrencies like BTC as margin collateral, instead of just USDT, with haircuts applied to account for price volatility.
Binance is the first major exchange to offer perpetuals tied to silver, building on the trend pioneered by relatively smaller venues like MEXC and BTCC.