News

The @CFTC just took an important step toward adopting a federal rulebook for crypto market structure: the Commission proposed rules for exchanges that let Americans trade crypto with leverage, including a new type of CFTC registration that is fit for purpose. An exchange’s regulatory path would follow its product set: (1) state licensing for spot trading, backstopped by the CFTC's anti-fraud and anti-manipulation authority; (2) CFTC registration for leverage under rules written for crypto; and (3) the existing DCM framework for perps and other derivatives. Builders shipping code onchain, and the Americans using it, would know where they stand under federal law. Separately, the CFTC is working directly with builders to develop lawful pathways for onchain markets in the United States, and is drafting a policy so that developers who publish software but do not take orders, control execution, or hold customer assets would not have to register as brokers. Thank you to @ChairmanSelig and the CFTC staff for the effort behind today's proposal and for putting onchain markets on the agenda.

Yesterday, HPC responded to @EU_Finance’s review of MiCA, our first filing outside the U.S., urging the Commission to build on existing EU rules for onchain markets. The EU wrote the first rulebook for crypto-asset markets. Its review now asks which rulebook governs perpetual futures, one of the most traded derivative products in the world. Our position: perpetual futures belong under MiFID II, the EU’s framework for derivatives, regardless of how they are recorded or what asset class they reference. Applying MiFID II with attention to how onchain markets work will give EU investors access to regulated markets that are deeper, continuously margined, and verifiable by anyone. Read it here:

https://x.com/i/article/2105629196357660672

Today, the @CFTC took an important step toward bringing regulated onchain markets to the United States: firms can now keep required records on a public blockchain without being required to maintain a separate offchain copy. The CFTC also clarified that firms can invest customer funds in tokenized versions of investments that are already permitted. That matters because a regulated firm can now use a public blockchain as its system of record, where every entry is transparent, tamper-evident, and verifiable by anyone. Those are the assurances the CFTC’s recordkeeping rules exist to provide, and public blockchains deliver them by design. In July, HPC and @phantom asked the CFTC to provide this clarity. Today, the CFTC delivered.

Today, we filed an amicus brief in CME v. Selig with a @CooleyLLP team led by former Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, urging the court to grant the @CFTC's motion to dismiss. For years, Americans were pushed offshore to trade perpetual futures. This spring, the @CFTC opened the door at home. In June, CME sued to close it. That anticompetitive effort must fail.

https://x.com/i/article/2085461180223770624

"We have a window of opportunity here where we can actually move the needle and get these products into the United States in a regulated fashion, and then build up the most liquid markets in the world." @jchervinsky on The Rollup. Full interview below.

Perpetual contracts were not on the agenda at the @CFTC's first Innovation Advisory Committee meeting, but they still came up in every session, in a room with some of the biggest names in finance. Today, we submitted a statement supporting the Commission's work to bring perpetual futures markets onshore and keep them at the center of the innovation agenda. Read it here:

https://x.com/i/article/2092943651911483392

Oil prices move 24/7. The markets that American businesses use to hedge them do not. Today, HPC and @tradexyz filed a joint comment letter asking the @CFTC to open a regulated path for energy perpetual contracts and 24/7 trading in the United States. During February's oil shock, roughly two-thirds of the weekend price move had already occurred onchain before U.S. futures reopened Sunday evening. The next crisis should find American businesses able to manage their risk in real time, under CFTC oversight.

https://x.com/i/article/2092582518595649536

The world's largest markets for perpetual contracts grew offshore because U.S. regulators hadn’t answered a basic question: are they futures or swaps? The CFTC began answering that question in May, allowing the first perpetuals to list on a U.S. exchange as futures contracts. Today, we asked both the @SECGov and @CFTC to confirm that equity perpetuals can be listed as security futures. That confirmation would provide the clarity necessary to bring these products onshore.

http://x.com/i/article/2091857718545965056

1/ Over one weekend in March, WTI closed at $91.03 and reopened at $106.61, a 15.8% move. The onchain oil perpetual was open for all 49 hours in between. The benchmark was not. Today, we published research showing how 24/7 perpetuals like these expand U.S. derivatives markets.

http://x.com/i/article/2090785864418766848

Hyperliquid.

Americans should have access to pre-IPO perpetuals. Cerebras opened 89% above its IPO price. SK Hynix 14%. SpaceX 11%. Each time, a public market on Hyperliquid signaled the gap before trading began.IPO modernization offers a chance to put that price signal to work for issuers and investors. Today, with @tradexyz , we filed a joint comment letter introducing pre-IPO perpetuals (IPOPs) to the SEC. Inside, we describe the five IPOP markets that trade[XYZ] has launched so far on Hyperliquid and outline the questions that the SEC must resolve before these markets can serve Americans. Read it here ⬇️

https://x.com/i/article/2089683815434272768

The stock market’s rulebook was built for 2005’s technology. The SEC is proposing to retire the trade-through rule and protect investors through best execution: a duty that follows your order to any venue, at any hour. Together with @DouroLabs we filed a joint comment supporting the rescission and recommending how best execution should work for tokenized securities trading onchain. Read it here ⏬

https://x.com/i/article/2089320810871656448

Farmers were the original beneficiaries of America’s derivatives markets. Futures trading was born in the grain trade in the 1800s, and federal oversight ran through the U.S. Department of Agriculture for five decades. The House and Senate Agriculture Committees oversee the CFTC to this day. On July 29, the @CFTC 's Agricultural Advisory Committee convened for the first time in more than two years. Today we filed a statement supporting the Committee’s work and the Commission’s phased approach to perpetual futures.

http://x.com/i/article/2085697034137251840

Markets take weekends off. The news doesn't. New @blockworksres research measured 614 weekends of live 24/7 trading in equities, commodities, FX, and indices on Hyperliquid. The first hard data on what happens when markets simply keep going. The weekend markets held up: weekday-tight spreads, weekday-cost fills, while everything else was closed. And the weekend prices knew where markets would reopen. They cut the typical reopening miss in half, and on big moves they called the direction right 94.9% of the time. Read the full report:

Prediction markets topped $50 billion in trading volume last month, and the biggest names in traditional finance are moving in. Today, with @multicoin, we filed a joint comment supporting the @CFTC 's proposed prediction markets framework. These markets have grown up. The proposed framework gives them what they deserve: durable standards, known in advance, under one federal rulebook. Our comment expresses support for the Commission’s approach and offers two recommendations to make an already strong rulebook even more targeted. Read it here:

http://x.com/i/article/2081710542939357184

Writing the software isn't running the market. The same should hold true onchain. With the right rules, the CFTC can modernize these markets, keep builders in the United States, and give customers more control over their funds. Today, with @phantom, we filed a joint comment letter with the CFTC with recommendations on how to achieve that result. Read it here:

http://x.com/i/article/2075233075642892288

For years, Americans were pushed offshore to trade perpetual futures while the rest of the world could trade them at home. This spring, U.S. regulators finally opened a compliant path to these markets here. Today, the largest U.S. exchange, CME, went to court to close it. This is what happens when one company controls a market. By @BetterMarkets' count, CME runs about 92% of U.S. exchange-traded derivatives. When one venue holds that much volume, everyone else carries the cost. Less choice, higher prices. Perpetual futures are the first genuinely new derivatives product to reach U.S.-regulated markets in over a decade. More competition among exchanges is best for the people who actually use these markets. These products deserve clear rules. The real question is whether Americans get access to innovative new financial products, or whether one incumbent keeps them locked out. We think they deserve access. As CFTC @ChairmanSelig put it: "Incumbents will always fear the future." But none of us should fear the incumbents.

Today we filed a comment with @paradigm on @USTreasury's proposed rule for stablecoin issuers. U.S.-regulated stablecoins power billions of dollars in daily trading, lending, and settlement. Our comment offers recommendations to preserve their critical role in onchain markets.

http://x.com/i/article/2064369559608377345