While Bitcoin continues to push into new all-time highs, Ether has also tagged new year-to-date highs following news the Chicago Mercantile Exchange plans to launch ETH futures contracts in 2021.

BTC spiked into new highs on Dec. 16, gaining 10% in one day from $19,140 to $21,340. Dec. 17 has seen BTC extend the rally by a further 4% so far — with the market currently searching for support near $21,800 after posting a local top of $22,160.

While many traders appear to be glued to the Bitcoin charts, Ethereum also pushed into new yearly highs after gaining 8.5% yesterday. Today the price increased to a local top of $656 on BitMEX, with the markets currently hovering half a percent above yesterday’s closing price of $640.

The rally followed news that CME intends to launch ETH futures in 2021 pending regulatory approval. It cited strong customer demand for the product.

CME launched its Bitcoin futures contracts in December 2017, which signaled the top of that year’s historic rally.

Some predict even greater moves upwards for ETH to come. Twitter user ‘Altcoin Sherpa’ noted that ETH has begun multi-month rallies in December that saw gains of at least 100% for each of the past three years. As such, the analyst predicts Ether will soon surpass $1,000 for the first time since 2017.

$ETH has started its run every December the last 3 years with at least 100%+ ROI over the following months. What makes you think this year will be any different? #Ethereum to $1000+ within the next few months IMO. $ETHUSD pic.twitter.com/TWznrDjXaU

— Altcoin Sherpa (@AltcoinSherpa) December 15, 2020

Ethereum perma-bull ‘wolfofethereum.eth’ speculated that “the $ETH show is just getting started,” highlighting that Ether has outperformed BTC by 185% over the past 12 months.

Set Protocol’s Anthony Sassano posted an image comparing the metrics for Ethereum when it last broke $500 and the situation today — noting a 900% increase in active developers, an 80% increase in 24-hour transaction count, a 60% increase in active addresses, and a 150% increase in network hash rate.

$ETH first hit $500 on November 29th, 2017 during the late stages of the last bull market.

Recently, $ETH hit $500 again so I decided to track how a few different metrics have grown since November 29th, 2017. pic.twitter.com/dvyilK8Vuc

— Anthony Sassano | sassal.eth (@sassal0x) December 16, 2020

ETH/BTC shorts on Bitfinex are currently sitting at record lows, suggesting the markets expect Ether to make gains over BTC for the foreseeable future. ETH/BTC longs are at their highest level since February 2018.