Kalshi advances stock perps amid CME, Nasdaq, Cboe objections
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) argued that CME suffered no concrete harm from its approval of Kalshi Bitcoin perpetual futures. CME, Nasdaq, and Cboe object to Kalshi's plans to clear single-stock perpetual contracts, contending the products should be classified as security-based swaps rather than futures. The CFTC cited crypto futures trading volume data in its response to CME's challenge. The filing marks another front in the battle between Kalshi and incumbent exchange operators over new product categories.
Kalshi's perpetual futures push now faces coordinated resistance from three of the largest US exchange operators. CME, Nasdaq, and Cboe have the resources to sustain multi-year litigation and lobby for rule changes that reclassify Kalshi's products as security-based swaps. If they succeed, Kalshi would face Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) jurisdiction rather than CFTC oversight, forcing a shift to swap execution infrastructure and compliance regimes built for institutional derivatives desks.
The CFTC's defense of its own approval authority suggests regulators see value in expanding event-contract venues, but the agency is already stretched across state preemption fights in Ohio and Tennessee. Kalshi must now fight on three fronts: defending its CFTC clearances against incumbent lawsuits, holding state gambling shields, and keeping product launches on timeline while legal budgets multiply. The first adverse ruling on product classification would give competitors a template to challenge every perpetual contract Kalshi lists.
Kalshi joins a widening set of CFTC-registered platforms battling state gambling suits while federal rulemaking lags, after the Sixth Circuit stripped its preemption shield in Ohio and Tennessee and the NFL backed states' Supreme Court push to cement the gambling frame.