Exploring the Best Crypto Coins for Futures Trading in 2025
I've been watching people dive headfirst into crypto futures trading with varying degrees of success and disaster, and one of the first questions they always ask is which cryptocurrencies make sense for this kind of leveraged speculation. Futures trading can multiply your gains when you're right, but it has an equally impressive ability to amplify your losses when the market moves against you, which happens more often than most people expect.
The crypto you choose to trade futures on isn't just about picking your favorite project or following the latest hype — it comes down to practical considerations like whether there's enough trading volume to get in and out of positions, how predictably volatile the asset tends to be, and whether it has enough market history to give you some sense of its behavior patterns.
I'm going to walk through some of the cryptocurrencies that see serious futures trading volume and explain why traders gravitate toward them, along with the specific characteristics that make certain assets more suitable.
What Makes a Crypto Coin Good for Futures Trading?
Here are some of the key factors to consider when choosing the best coins for futures trading:
Market Dominance and Liquidity: Larger, more established coins generally offer more liquidity, which makes entering and exiting positions easier. High liquidity also means tighter spreads, which is beneficial for futures traders.
Volatility: Volatility is a double-edged sword. It provides the potential for larger profits but also increases risk. The level of volatility is an important consideration when choosing the best asset for futures.
Historical Performance: An asset's historical price movements can give traders a sense of how it behaves under different market conditions, which can be useful for making informed decisions.
Market Trends: The growth and adoption of a coin’s ecosystem can affect its future price movements. The best coins with strong use cases tend to have more predictable futures prices.
Based on these factors, here are several crypto coins that are popular in the futures markets:
The 5 Best Crypto Coins for Futures Trading in 2025
1. Bitcoin (BTC)
Launched in January 2009, Bitcoin (BTC) is the top cryptocurrency by market capitalisation. With a market cap of nearly $2.1 trillion, it is dominating the crypto asset industry with a 62.2% market share.
In addition to its extensive market history, Bitcoin's rock-solid reputation is further reinforced by its resilient Proof-of-Work (PoW) network that ensures decentralisation and security within the ecosystem.
BTC has a 24-hour volume of $33.3 billion, making it one of the best choices for liquidity in the cryptocurrency market. With wide availability across both spot and derivatives markets, Bitcoin futures pairs have deep liquidity.
In terms of volatility, Bitcoin is less volatile than most digital assets due to its massive market cap and extensive history. However, it's important to note that cryptocurrencies, in general, are highly volatile compared to major fiat currencies, gold, or top US stocks. While Bitcoin is less subject to the extreme price fluctuations of lower-cap digital assets, it is still more volatile than most asset classes.
Bitcoin is a deflationary asset, where a halving mechanism occurs approximately every four years to reduce block rewards—and the coin's annual inflation—by 50%. It is a feature many investors and traders find enticing in the digital asset.
2. Ethereum (ETH)
Launched in July 2015, Ethereum (ETH) is the second-largest crypto asset, with a market cap of $293 billion and a $27.95 billion volume in the last 24 hours. This makes it the third-most traded cryptocurrency in the market, offering spot and derivatives traders access to high liquidity and general accessibility on exchange platforms.
Ethereum is the most established smart contract blockchain in the market, and it has been designed with security and decentralisation in mind. With a $61.52 billion total value locked (TVL) in decentralised finance (DeFi) protocols, it has a nearly 55% share in the DeFi market as the sector's leader.
Since the Merge, Ethereum's best-known and most high-profile hard fork to date that transitioned the smart contract blockchain from the power-intensive Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus mechanism to the energy-efficient Proof-of-Stake (PoS) algorithm, the network is automatically burning a part of ETH transaction fees. This provides the cryptocurrency with deflationary properties, which decreased its annual inflation from 3.76% (simulated) to only 0.46%. In fact, the new ETH supply in a year is substantially less than BTC's 0.83%.
In addition to the Ethereum blockchain serving as the hotbed for numerous major market trends—ranging from the ICO craze to the NFT, DeFi, and Play-to-Earn (P2E) booms.
3. Solana (SOL)
Launched in March 2020, Solana (SOL) is a high-throughput Layer 1 blockchain co-founded by Anatoly Yakovenko and Raj Gokal. As of June 24, 2025, SOL has a market cap of $76.71 billion, which is the sixth-highest in the crypto space.
Solana offers users inexpensive gas fees due to its rapid 0.4-second block time and high scalability, which are achieved primarily by SOL's Proof-of-History (PoH) global cryptographic clock mechanism and Tower Byzantine Fault Tolerance (Tower BFT) consensus algorithm. With instantaneous and cheap transactions, the high-throughput chain is an attractive choice for crypto market participants—traders included.
Despite its financial ties with the collapsed FTX digital asset exchange, Solana has demonstrated one of the best recoveries after the event. With an over $6 billion TVL, it is currently the third-largest DeFi chain and a top blockchain in sectors like GameFi and NFTs.
Similarly to Ethereum, Solana is burning a portion (50%) of transaction fees to create a deflationary impact on SOL's value.
4. Ripple (XRP)
Launched in June 2012, Ripple (XRP) is a payment-focused blockchain (XRP Ledger), organisation (Ripple Labs), and cryptocurrency (XRP). Serving both consumers and institutional clients, the project leverages XRP and the XRP Ledger's (XRPL) high scalability, throughput, and speed to offer rapid and cost-efficient transactions.
Ripple was featured extensively in the news in the last few years in regard to Ripple Labs' high-profile case with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). After a partial victory in July 2023, only a $125 million penalty was imposed on the blockchain project in August 2024, which is a fraction of the $2 billion sought by the SEC. Since then, the regulator filed to appeal a 2023 court ruling, which may indicate that the case is far from over yet.
Currently, XRP has a $129 billion market cap, as well as a $4.34 trading volume in the last 24 hours that offers traders decent liquidity while trading the asset.
5. Dogecoin (DOGE)
Launched in December 2013, Dogecoin (DOGE) is the original memecoin. While it started out as a fun project inspired by the viral "Doge" meme, DOGE has since become the 9th top cryptocurrency by market cap. With a $1.6 billion trading volume in the last 24 hours, it provides spot and futures traders with high liquidity to trade the memecoin.
Despite competition increasing exponentially in the last few years, DOGE has remained the top memecoin project. It is backed by a strong community, supported by many celebrities, has its own blockchain, and has been involved in initiatives like the Watford Football Club's sponsorship or DOGE-1 CubeSat Moon mission.
Trade Crypto Futures on VALR
Whether you’re interested in the stability of Bitcoin, the smart contract capabilities of Ethereum, or the growth potential of Solana, VALR offers a platform where you can trade futures with confidence. With deep liquidity, low fees, and access to a wide range of cryptocurrencies, VALR offers some of the best conditions for crypto futures trading.
Ready to start trading crypto futures? Open an account on VALR today and explore the opportunities in crypto futures.
Risk Disclosure
Trading or investing in crypto assets is risky and may result in the loss of capital as the value may fluctuate.
VALR (Pty) Ltd is a licensed financial services provider (FSP #53308).
Futures trading is provided by VALR DAM Pty Ltd as a Juristic Representative of CAEP Asset Managers Pty Ltd (FSP number: 33933) an authorised financial services provider.
Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article are the personal views of the author and should not form the basis for making investment decisions, nor be construed as a recommendation or advice to engage in investment transactions.