$USDC USDC futures are financial contracts that allow traders to bet on the future price of USDC (USD Coin) without actually owning the USDC tokens themselves. While USDC is designed to maintain a stable 1:1 peg with the US Dollar, its futures contracts are primarily used for several key purposes:

1. **Margin and Settlement Currency:** Many cryptocurrency futures exchanges offer "USD-margined" or "USD-settled" contracts where profits and losses are denominated and settled in stablecoins like USDC or USDT. For instance, if you trade a BTC/USDC Perpetual Futures contract, the price of Bitcoin is quoted in USDC, and any P&L is paid out in USDC. This removes the volatility risk that comes from using a volatile cryptocurrency as collateral.

2. **Hedging:** Although less common due to USDC's stability, traders holding large amounts of USDC might use futures to hedge against a slight deviation from its $1 peg or against risks associated with the stablecoin issuer.

3. **Yield Strategies and Arbitrage:** Some platforms may offer structured products that use futures trading strategies with USDC as collateral to generate yield. Professional traders also use USDC futures in arbitrage to profit from small price differences between exchanges or between spot and futures markets.

Key features of USDC futures include:

* **Quoted and Settled in Stablecoin:** They are typically quoted and settled in USDC or another stablecoin.

* **Leverage:** They often allow for leverage, enabling control of larger positions with less capital.

* **Perpetual or Dated:** They can be perpetual (no expiration) or dated (specific expiration).

Major cryptocurrency derivatives exchanges like Binance Futures, Bybit, Kraken Derivatives, and dYdX offer contracts margined and settled in USDC.