Equity perpetual contracts have reached $2.2 billion in open interest, overtaking commodities for the first time, according to data shared by @a16zcrypto. The crossover marks a dramatic shift from a year ago, when equity perpetuals were nearly nonexistent, and could create a more favorable environment for altcoins even as broader crypto markets trade mixed.
Ondo Perps CEO David Wells said in Seoul that offering perpetual futures in the United States is a huge opportunity, although any onshore product would need a different structure for settlement and clearing. His comments come as regulators and firms test how perps can enter U.S. markets: President Donald Trump said in August the CFTC was working to bring Hyperliquid into the U.S., and Kraken’s parent Payward has announced plans to list Hyperliquid’s HIP-3 perpetual markets for eligible U.S. clients through CFTC-regulated Bitnomial Exchange and NinjaTrader Clearing. Coinbase has also filed to launch single-stock perps in the U.S.
Ondo Finance has filed letters with the SEC and the CFTC arguing that U.S. equity perpetual contracts fit the existing category of security futures under the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. Launched in July, Ondo Perps is a Panama-based offshore venue for tokenized U.S. stocks, equity ETFs, and commodities. Traders can use USDC or eligible Ondo Stocks tokens as margin, with up to 20x leverage on some contracts. The platform says tokenized stock collateral is more capital-efficient because users can remain invested in the underlying asset while using it as margin.
On Monday, Ondo Perps said users can now buy and sell 12 Ondo Stocks directly on the platform, eliminating the need to manage positions across two venues. The team plans to expand that availability to all Ondo Stocks. Since its private beta, Ondo Perps has accumulated approximately $14 billion in trading volume and recently recorded open interest above $100 million, according to Wells. Those figures point to increasing demand for real-world asset products and tokenization.
