Kraken’s parent company is taking another run at U.S. derivatives, this time by tying regulated perpetual futures to Hyperliquid’s on-chain infrastructure. The twist is that it wants the whole thing wrapped in CFTC-friendly plumbing instead of the usual crypto chaos.
- Payward plans regulated Hyperliquid perps for eligible U.S. clients.
- Bitnomial would handle exchange, clearing, and settlement.
- The markets still need regulatory approval and are not live.
- Access would be permissioned, not open to every U.S. trader.
On Sept. 16, Payward said it plans to launch regulated on-chain perpetual futures for eligible U.S. customers using Hyperliquid’s HIP-3 infrastructure. Bitnomial would handle deployment, clearing, and settlement under existing CFTC-regulated entities.
This is a serious attempt to fuse public blockchain execution with the boring-but-essential machinery of U.S. derivatives law. That tension is the whole point. If it works, it gives crypto markets a cleaner path into the United States. If it doesn’t, it becomes another polished compliance experiment that dies in the paperwork pile.
Perpetual futures, or perps, are derivatives with no expiry date. Traders use them to speculate, hedge, and trade with leverage. In crypto, they are one of the biggest sources of volume and fees, which is exactly why exchanges keep chasing them like raccoons after a dumpster full of expired caviar.
Payward said Hyperliquid would be the first blockchain protocol used for the initiative. Under the proposed structure, Bitnomial Exchange would act as the HIP-3 deployer, Bitnomial Clearinghouse would handle clearing and settlement, and NinjaTrader Clearing would carry client accounts. Hyperliquid’s on-chain order book would be used for matching and recording trades.
An order book is simply the list of buy and sell orders that helps pair traders with each other. Putting that on-chain makes the market more transparent, but it does not magically erase the rules that govern U.S. derivatives. The design keeps execution on public blockchain rails while wrapping access, clearing, and settlement in a regulated framework.
That matters because HIP-3 was originally built as permissionless infrastructure. Hyperliquid later added optional permissioning through on-chain allowlists, which makes it possible to restrict access for regulated or institution-only markets. In other words, the protocol can now be used to build a market that looks on-chain without turning into a free-for-all.
It also means Americans will not get unrestricted access to everything Hyperliquid offers. A U.S. customer would need a futures account through NinjaTrader Clearing, approval for the relevant Bitnomial market, and an address on the required NinjaTrader and Bitnomial allowlists.
Put bluntly: this is not “any wallet, any time.” It is a permissioned market wearing blockchain clothes.
Payward’s head of U.S. derivatives, Jon Pham, and co-CEO Arjun Sethi are tied to the push, which appears to be a more concrete version of discussions first reported in August. Earlier testing involved a deployment called “Kraken HIP-3 test DEX” that whitelisted 10 wallets.
The legal bridge is Bitnomial. The CFTC designated Bitnomial Exchange as a contract market in 2020. Bitnomial Clearinghouse is registered as a derivatives clearing organization, and CFTC records say it can clear futures, options on futures, and fully collateralized swaps. NinjaTrader Clearing is a CFTC-registered futures commission merchant and National Futures Association member with NFA ID 0309379.
That stack matters because U.S. derivatives are not just about where trades match. They also require the exchange, the clearinghouse, and the customer-facing intermediary to be properly registered and supervised. That’s the part crypto often hand-waves away until the regulator walks in and kicks over the furniture.
Payward also has real scale behind this move. In its second-quarter 2026 financial update, the company said it had 6.6 million funded accounts at the end of June, up 42% year over year. A platform with that kind of retail base has every reason to keep pushing into derivatives, where trading activity is typically stickier and more lucrative than plain spot trading.
The market opportunity is hardly small. DefiLlama data show Hyperliquid had about $237 billion in perpetual futures volume over the latest 30-day period, $45.5 billion over seven days, and more than $5.3 trillion in cumulative perpetual volume.
CoinGecko’s 2026 State of Crypto Perpetuals report shows just how large the category has become. According to CoinGecko, centralized perpetual exchanges handled $85.3 trillion in volume during 2025, while decentralized perpetual venues generated $6.38 trillion, up from $1.50 trillion in 2024. CoinGecko also said average monthly volume among the 12 largest perpetual DEXs reached $611.57 billion in the first months of 2026.
That is why this matters. Perpetuals are no longer a side quest for degens with too much leverage and not enough sleep. They are core market infrastructure, and whoever controls the rails gets a serious share of flow, fees, and influence.
Hyperliquid is a logical venue for the experiment because HIP-3 lets builders launch markets on shared execution infrastructure. Hyperliquid documentation says deployers control contract definitions, oracle prices, leverage limits, and settlement procedures. That flexibility is powerful, but it also carries risk. Bad oracle pricing or sloppy leverage settings can amplify forced liquidations and turn a market into a wrecking ball.
There is also a concentration problem. Payward said one existing HIP-3 operator accounts for around 98% of builder-deployed open interest. A Hyperliquid Research Collective report cited by crypto.news estimated TradeXYZ processed $202.36 billion in Q2 and controlled 95.1% of HIP-3 trading volume.
That is a useful reality check. HIP-3 may be technically interesting, but its builder-deployed market activity still looks heavily concentrated. A system can be on-chain and still end up dominated by a single operator. Decentralization by brochure is cheap; decentralization by usage is the part that actually counts.
One more detail is worth keeping straight: Bitnomial already lists regulated crypto perpetual products tied to XRP, Stellar, Cardano, Tezos, and Litecoin. It also has a HYPE/USD spot product, self-certified earlier in 2026. That HYPE spot contract is separate from the proposed Hyperliquid HIP-3 perpetual markets, and the two should not be confused.
For now, the big caveat is simple: the markets are not live. Payward has not announced a launch date, and the proposal is still subject to regulatory approval. That is the real gatekeeper here. In U.S. derivatives, the paperwork is not a side character. It is the boss fight.
Key takeaways
-
What is Payward trying to launch?
Regulated on-chain perpetual futures for eligible U.S. customers using Hyperliquid’s HIP-3 infrastructure. -
Is this already live?
No. The proposed markets are still pending regulatory approval and have not launched. -
Who would handle the regulated plumbing?
Bitnomial Exchange would deploy the market, Bitnomial Clearinghouse would clear and settle it, and NinjaTrader Clearing would carry client accounts. -
Can any U.S. trader use it?
No. Access would be permissioned through the required accounts, approvals, and allowlists. -
Why does Hyperliquid matter here?
Hyperliquid and HIP-3 let deployers launch perp markets on-chain with configurable parameters, making it one of the few protocols that can plausibly support a regulated builder-deployed market. -
What could derail it?
Regulatory denial, thin liquidity from restricted access, and concentration risk if the market ends up dominated by a small number of operators.
This is one of the more serious attempts yet to bolt DeFi-style execution onto the U.S. derivatives machine. That could become a genuinely useful bridge between blockchain markets and regulated finance. Or it could end up as a clever structure that looks better on paper than it trades in practice. Crypto has earned its skepticism, and this one deserves a hard stare.
Further reading
- Kraken parent plans regulated Hyperliquid perps
- Understanding HTML Skip Links: Accessibility and CFTC trading organization filings
- Payward Intends to Bring Onchain Perpetual Futures to U.S. Clients Starting with Hyperliquid
- Kraken Launches Bitcoin Perpetual Futures for U.S. Traders
- Hyperliquid Faces FCA Scrutiny as Wall Street Eyes Crypto
- Hyperliquid Faces Regulatory Pressure Over Crypto Perps: 5 Paths Forward
