Hyperliquid Negotiates with Payward to Offer Perpetual Contracts in the U.S.
According to Bloomberg, Hyperliquid Labs is in deep negotiations with Payward, the parent company of Kraken, to offer perpetual futures to U.S. traders through the latter. A few weeks ago, U.S. President Donald Trump stated that his administration is working to bring this rapidly growing platform into the U.S. market.
Insiders say that if the deal receives regulatory approval, U.S. users will be able to trade perpetual futures linked to token prices built on Hyperliquid's blockchain technology via Payward's Bitnomial. The individuals requested anonymity due to a lack of authorization to discuss the matter publicly. Both Payward and Hyperliquid Labs declined to comment. Reports indicate that Payward has submitted a basic structural proposal to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).
Bitnomial is a designated contract market, clearinghouse, and brokerage licensed by the CFTC, which Payward is expected to acquire around May 2026. In June of the same year, Kraken launched perpetual contracts for Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, and others through Bitnomial for qualified U.S. customers, trading alongside spot, margin, and Chicago Mercantile Exchange futures on the same interface.
Hyperliquid specializes in on-chain perpetuals and builder deployment markets, with global perpetual trading largely occurring in offshore venues. The negotiations aim to bring some linked varieties into the compliant U.S. market rather than opening the entire decentralized operation chain directly to U.S. retail.
Mechanically, buyers are U.S. traders who want to engage in perpetuals in domestic accounts while accessing Hyperliquid's ecosystem, while sellers are those dealing with the regulatory premium of offshore perpetuals. The event is driven by license acquisitions and statements from the White House, with funds flowing from offshore order books to CFTC-cleared markets; benefiting Payward, which has acquired a full suite of derivative brand licenses, while putting pressure on purely offshore perpetual markets that still keep U.S. users out of the chain's entry.
Source: Public Information
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Hyperliquid lacks a legal entity in the U.S., while Payward lacks the license to continuously introduce new on-chain varieties into the market. The negotiations connect the prices of decentralized order books to designated contract market clearing accounts. Trump's statement "let it in" places political permission ahead of CFTC forms.
The capital path involves acquiring Bitnomial to secure an exchange, clearinghouse, and futures commission merchant, then writing some of Hyperliquid's tokens into tradable contracts. Funds from U.S. qualified customers' margins enter the Bitnomial clearing pool, rather than directly into Hyperliquid's on-chain vault. Regulatory approval is the gateway: without it, it's just an in-depth negotiation.
The benchmark is CME Bitcoin futures bringing offshore leverage back to the U.S., and Coinbase launching themed index perpetuals at the same time. Derivatives are at a stage where "perpetuals must come onshore": by 2025, global perpetual trading is projected to reach trillions of dollars, while the U.S. has long only provided for futures with expiration dates. Whoever can write new chain varieties into CFTC contracts will first capture U.S. demand from offshore markets.
Structurally, this belongs to regulatory changes. The mechanism is: when the White House wants to pull offshore platforms back into the country, the path is not to change chain governance but to find a licensed parent company for packaging. Decentralized trading can remain on-chain, but the legal counterpart for U.S. customers must remain within the Chicago framework.
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- On-chain transactions require licenses for entry.
- First acquire a clearinghouse, then discuss writing new varieties into contracts.
- Political permission can open doors, but forms are needed for perpetuals to come onshore.