In response to institutional investors' concerns about the risks of trading in a new asset class, TMX Group, Canada's major stock market operator, has revealed plans to launch its first-ever crypto futures product.

While speaking to Reuters, TMX Group's John McKenzie said that the firm plans to release the product on the Montreal Exchange later this year. According to Mackenzie, "more institutional investors and dealers are [...] holding more crypto assets within their portfolios or for their clients or in ETFs," adding they are working on how to mitigate risk due to crypto's huge volatility.

Cointelegraph reached out to TMX Group for more details regarding this development. This article will be updated pending new information.

Cryptocurrency assets have suffered significant drops in recent months as investors sought safer investments amid expectations of interest rate hikes by central banks. They've made progress in recovering some of their losses in recent weeks, with Bitcoin 

BTC

$18,148

 regaining past the $42K mark and the price of Ether 

ETH

$1,391

 pulling back to retest $3,000 support levels.

The news from TMX Group arrives as cryptocurrencies are increasingly gaining interest from investors and organizations. The most well-known example is business intelligence software firm MicroStrategy, which has converted all of its cash reserves into Bitcoin and even raised debt to finance further purchases.

Related: MicroStrategy CEO won’t sell $5B BTC stash despite crypto winter

As reported by Cointelegraph earlier this week, KPMG, one of Canada's top accounting firms, added Bitcoin and Ethereum to its corporate treasury, becoming the latest big firm to convert a portion of its fiat assets into cryptocurrencies.

Electric automaker Tesla was holding nearly $2 billion in Bitcoin on its balance sheet at the end of 2021, according to official records published on Monday. According to Bitcoin Treasuries data, forty publicly listed businesses now hold BTC.