Kalshi and Kraken Owner Payvard Join Coinbase in Race to Bring Stock Perpetual Futures to US Traders

Kalshi has filed to offer perpetual futures tied to individual US stocks, and it brought company: Payward, the parent of crypto exchange Kraken, filed its own version the same day, hours after Coinbase submitted a nearly identical proposal. Three firms are now racing to bring crypto’s favorite derivative — the perpetual future — to Wall Street’s most traditional asset class, and regulators have the final say.

By Raj Patel | September 19, 2026

The Hook: Three Filings, One Product, One Question

The prediction market Kalshi filed its proposed rule change with the Securities and Exchange Commission and submitted it to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission for approval on Friday, September 19, according to Cointelegraph. The CFTC has not yet approved the proposal. The filing landed the same day Coinbase submitted its own plan for single-stock perpetuals — a move BitcoinsNews covered earlier — meaning US traders could soon have three competing venues for a product that has never existed in the American market.

For regular investors, the stakes are simple. A perpetual future is a contract that never expires — think of it as a bet on a stock’s price that you can hold for a day or a year, with automatic cash transfers between winners and losers keeping the price glued to the real share price. Crypto traders have used them for years on Bitcoin and Ether. Bringing them to Apple or Nvidia shares would let Americans trade equities around the clock with leverage, something today’s stock market simply does not allow.

What Exactly Was Filed

According to the filing documents, Kalshi’s proposed contracts would have no preset expiration date and would use periodic funding payments between long and short positions to keep prices aligned with the underlying stocks. Kalshi said the contracts would be treated as security futures products and cleared through its own CFTC-registered clearinghouse, Kalshi Klear.

Kalshi is not starting from zero. The exchange already offers perpetual futures tied to cryptocurrencies in the US — including Bitcoin, Ether, Solana and XRP — after receiving CFTC approval for its Bitcoin perpetual contract in May. The stock version would extend that playbook to equities.

• Kalshi — filed with the SEC and submitted to the CFTC on Friday; contracts structured as security futures products cleared through Kalshi Klear.
• Payward (Kraken) — filed through its Bitnomial Exchange, planning perpetuals tied to 10 US equities at launch, including Tesla, Nvidia, Apple, Microsoft and Amazon, with 24/5 trading in the works.
• Coinbase — filed its separate proposal the same day for single-stock perpetuals including Nvidia, Microsoft and Tesla on a 24/5 schedule.

The Core Conflict: Regulators Move While Congress Stalls

The timing is not a coincidence. The filings come days after the CLARITY Act failed to advance in the Senate on September 15, falling short of the 60 votes needed to proceed. A day after that vote, SEC Chair Paul Atkins said that “with or without legislation,” the agency would “act decisively” within its existing statutory authority to provide regulatory certainty for American investors and entrepreneurs.

That message appears to have been heard. Rather than waiting for Congress to draw clear lines between securities and commodities, companies are testing how far existing rules stretch. A single-stock perpetual sits deliberately at the intersection: the underlying stock is a security, the futures wrapper is derivatives territory, and both the SEC and CFTC will have a say in whether these products reach retail traders.

There is precedent for this multi-lane approach. Crypto.com registered the Nadex exchange with the SEC to offer single-stock futures, and Kraken’s Bitnomial has operated as a regulated derivatives venue for years. Kalshi itself spent years fighting the CFTC in court over event contracts before winning the right to list them. Each firm is betting its existing regulatory scaffolding is the fastest path to market.

Market Implications: Why This Matters for Your Portfolio

If approved, US-listed stock perpetuals would change how retail investors interact with the market in three concrete ways. First, trading hours: these products are designed for near-continuous sessions, meaning a Nvidia earnings shock at 3 a.m. could be traded instead of absorbed at the next open. Second, capital efficiency: futures require only a fraction of the position value upfront, amplifying both gains and losses. Third, fee competition: three venues chasing the same product usually means a price war for traders.

For crypto investors, the significance is more symbolic but arguably larger. The perpetual future is crypto’s signature invention — a derivative born on BitMEX and perfected on exchanges like Binance and Bybit. Wall Street firms now filing to import it into stocks is another sign of the two worlds merging, a trend that has already brought spot Bitcoin ETFs, tokenized stocks and 24/7 FX perpetuals to mainstream platforms this year. Bitcoin was trading around 81,454 USD on Saturday evening, with the broader market firmly focused on how quickly regulators green-light the next bridge between the two asset classes.

The Verdict

Nothing is approved yet, and the CFTC has offered no timeline. But the direction of travel is unmistakable. Within a single week, the CLARITY Act died, the SEC promised unilateral action, and three major trading firms filed for the same crypto-style stock product. The most likely outcome is a regulatory race: whichever agency clears a path first will set the template everyone else follows. For investors, the practical move is patience — and a close watch on CFTC dockets, because the firm that wins first-mover advantage here will shape how millions of Americans trade stocks for years to come.

The cryptocurrency market remains highly volatile. This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice.