Prediction market platform Kalshi has officially filed to offer perpetual futures tied to individual United States stocks, making a decisive move to bridge the gap between traditional equity markets and the high-leverage derivatives popular in the cryptocurrency sector.
The move places Kalshi alongside major industry players like Coinbase and Kraken in an escalating commercial and regulatory race to introduce crypto-style financial instruments into mainstream American stock trading.
According to regulatory filings submitted on Friday, Kalshi filed a proposed rule change with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) while simultaneously submitting the proposal to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) for formal approval. As of Friday, the CFTC has yet to sign off on the proposal.
Under the terms of the filing, the proposed perpetual contracts would operate without any preset expiration date. To maintain price stability and ensure they closely track the underlying assets, the contracts would utilize periodic funding payments exchanged dynamically between long and short market positions.
Kalshi indicated that these innovative contracts would be formally classified as security futures products. Consequently, they would be cleared directly through its proprietary, CFTC-registered clearinghouse, Kalshi Klear.
This latest filing arrives on the heels of a separate proposal submitted by Coinbase on the exact same day. Coinbase is similarly seeking regulatory clearance to offer perpetual futures tied to individual US equities, highlighting a coordinated push by digital asset companies to capture a lucrative segment of traditional financial markets.
For Kalshi, expanding into equity-linked derivatives represents a natural progression of its regulatory footprint. The platform already offers perpetual futures tied to several major cryptocurrencies in the United States, including Bitcoin, Ether, Solana, and XRP. That crypto-native derivatives capability was unlocked after Kalshi secured official CFTC approval for its flagship Bitcoin perpetual contract in May.
US Stock Perpetual Futures Race Expands
Kalshi and Coinbase are far from alone in their ambitions to reshape how Americans trade equities. The race to bring single-stock perpetual futures to the US market has quickly expanded to include other major digital asset heavyweights.
Payward, the parent company of prominent crypto exchange Kraken, has also entered the fray. Operating through its subsidiary, Bitnomial Exchange, Payward submitted its own formal filing with the SEC to offer these complex derivatives products, with the ultimate intention of making them accessible to everyday US traders directly on the Kraken platform.
In public disclosures regarding its filing, Payward outlined an aggressive initial rollout strategy. The exchange plans to launch perpetual futures tied to 10 prominent US equities at the outset, featuring blue-chip tech and consumer giants such as Tesla, Nvidia, Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon. Furthermore, Payward indicated that it is actively working toward establishing 24/5 trading capabilities for these equity-linked derivatives, echoing the continuous market access traditionally enjoyed by crypto traders.
The flurry of regulatory filings from Kalshi, Coinbase, and Payward comes at a sensitive time for the broader digital asset and financial technology sectors in Washington. The submissions follow closely on the heels of a legislative setback on Capitol Hill, where the CLARITY Act failed to advance in the United States Senate on September 15. The digital asset market structure bill ultimately fell short of the crucial 60 votes required to move forward in the legislative process.
Despite the legislative stall, federal regulators have signaled that they are prepared to shape the regulatory landscape independently. Just one day after the Senate vote failed to clear the threshold, SEC Chair Paul Atkins addressed the path forward, stating publicly that "with or without legislation," the regulatory agency would act decisively within the bounds of its existing statutory authority. Atkins emphasized that the SEC aims to provide much-needed regulatory certainty for both American investors and financial entrepreneurs, setting the stage for potential administrative rulemakings that could significantly impact how hybrid crypto-equity products are overseen in the United States.
