Ondo urges SEC, CFTC to bring US stock perpetuals onshore
Ondo urges SEC, CFTC regulators to bring perpetual futures on individual US stocks onshore, arguing existing security-futures laws already fit the products. In three Aug. 24 comment letters, Ondo said no new statute is required and that offshore trading tied to US-listed equities should move under domestic oversight.
Key Takeaways
- Ondo Finance filed three Aug. 24 letters asking the SEC and CFTC to allow US stock perpetual futures under current security-futures rules.
- Its Panama affiliate already offers stablecoin-settled stock perpetuals offshore, with about $8 billion in cumulative volume by Aug. 14.
- Ondo says funding payments can replace fixed expirations and keep contracts aligned with underlying share prices.
- The pitch lands as the SEC and CFTC deepen coordination, including a March memorandum of understanding on overlapping oversight.
What did Ondo ask US regulators to do?
Ondo Finance is calling on the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to bring perpetual futures linked to individual stocks into the United States. The firm argued that the products can already operate under the country’s existing security-futures framework without new rules.
According to Cointelegraph’s report, Ondo’s three Aug. 24 comment letters said existing rules can accommodate perpetual stock futures while accounting for modern margining practices and onchain market data. Related market and policy coverage lives in our Fintech & Crypto Alerts hub.
Why do stock perpetuals matter for US markets?
Ondo said its Panama-based affiliate already offers stablecoin-settled perpetual futures on individual US-listed stocks outside the United States. The platform recorded about $8 billion in cumulative trading volume as of Aug. 14, roughly six weeks after launch.
Many of those underlying stocks are principally traded on US exchanges. “Bringing that activity back to the U.S. should not be an open question; it’s something both agencies should actively pursue,” the company said. Ondo also argued that scheduled funding payments can keep perpetual contracts aligned with the price of their underlying stocks, performing a similar function to expiration in traditional futures.
“Nothing in the statutory definition of a security futures product requires a fixed expiration date,” Ondo said in its product-classification letter.
How does this fit the broader US crypto policy shift?
Ondo’s proposal comes as US regulators reconsider how existing market rules apply to onchain products, including perpetual futures and tokenized securities. President Donald Trump said in August that CFTC Chair Michael Selig was working to bring Hyperliquid into the United States in a “fully compliant and legal fashion.”
The SEC and CFTC have also stepped up coordination this year, signing a memorandum of understanding in March to harmonize oversight where their jurisdictions overlap. On Tuesday, the SEC proposed overhauling its decades-old transfer agent framework, citing growing demand for blockchain-native recordkeeping and tokenized securities.
Ondo ranks fourth among tokenized real-world asset managers with about $2.6 billion in distributed value, according to RWA.xyz data cited in the report. That footprint helps explain why its call to move stock perpetuals onshore is resonating across fintech and crypto desks.