Key Highlights
- Ondo Finance submitted three regulatory comment letters to the SEC and CFTC on August 24, proposing that perpetual futures linked to US equities be permitted under current security futures regulations.
- The company’s Panama-registered entity has been providing stablecoin-settled stock perpetual contracts to international clients, generating $8 billion in total volume within approximately six weeks of launching.
- The firm contends that perpetual contracts should qualify as security futures products despite lacking traditional expiration dates.
- Both agencies signed a collaborative agreement in March and are currently examining how current regulations apply to blockchain-based derivatives and tokenized assets.
- Hyperliquid’s HYPE token surged more than 20% following President Trump’s statement that officials were working to enable the platform’s US operations legally.
Ondo Finance has petitioned United States financial regulators to authorize perpetual futures contracts linked to individual equities for domestic trading, asserting that existing legislation provides sufficient authority to permit these instruments.
The tokenized asset platform delivered three formal comment letters to both the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission on August 24. The submission maintains that introducing stock perpetual futures requires no additional legislative action.
Ondo’s Regulatory Proposal
Ondo is requesting that both agencies classify perpetual stock futures as security futures products within the current regulatory framework. The letters address product categorization, collateral requirements, and the utilization of blockchain-sourced pricing information.
A central claim in the submission is that perpetual contracts should be recognized as security futures products even without predetermined settlement dates. Conventional futures contracts conclude on specific dates. Perpetual instruments instead employ periodic funding rate mechanisms to maintain price alignment with the underlying equity.
In this system, when a perpetual contract’s price exceeds the reference benchmark, participants with long positions make payments to those with short positions. This payment direction inverts when the contract price falls below the reference level. According to Ondo, this funding rate structure serves an economically equivalent purpose to traditional expiration mechanisms.
The company’s Panama-domiciled subsidiary currently provides these instruments to qualified international traders outside US jurisdiction. Operating with stablecoin settlement, the platform achieved $8 billion in aggregate trading volume by August 14, approximately six weeks following its initial launch.
Oversight Framework
The SEC and CFTC executed a memorandum of understanding this past March to enhance coordination in overlapping jurisdictional areas. Security futures products represent one such intersection, as the SEC maintains authority over securities markets while the CFTC governs US futures exchanges.
Ondo isn’t alone in pursuing this regulatory pathway. The Hyperliquid Policy Center submitted comparable documentation on August 24. That filing noted Hyperliquid’s equity perpetual offerings had facilitated over $480 billion in total notional volume during their initial 10-month period.
President Trump announced in August that CFTC Chair Michael Selig was actively working to establish a compliant framework for Hyperliquid’s US entry. After these remarks, Hyperliquid’s HYPE token appreciated more than 20% and has climbed nearly 49% throughout the past month, currently trading near $81.
Ashley Ebersole, former SEC legal counsel, indicated that establishing a US regulatory framework for blockchain-based perpetuals might require 10 to 12 months if agencies proceed through formal rulemaking procedures, though the timeline could accelerate if regulators utilize existing statutory authority.
Earlier this week, the SEC additionally proposed amendments to its transfer agent regulations to accommodate blockchain-based record maintenance and tokenized securities.
Among tokenized real-world asset managers, Ondo holds the fourth position with approximately $2.6 billion in distributed value, per data from RWA.xyz.
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