Coinbase has filed with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to list single-stock perpetual futures in the United States, moving to bring a derivatives product widely used in crypto markets to individual US equities.

The filing, submitted Friday through Coinbase Derivatives, seeks regulatory approval for contracts that would give US traders 24/5 exposure to individual stocks without requiring them to own the underlying shares, an around-the-clock weekday schedule that extends beyond the regular trading hours of US equity exchanges. Unlike traditional futures contracts, perpetual futures do not expire. The submission is documented in a notice published on the CFTC's website.

Coinbase said the products would build on its existing US perpetual futures market, extending the contract structure to individual stocks for US traders. The proposed contracts are classified by the CFTC as single-stock futures and remain pending regulatory approval, meaning the CFTC's review will determine whether and when the product reaches US traders.

Source: Coinbase on X

The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Coinbase plans to initially offer perpetual futures tied to roughly 50 to 60 stocks, including Apple, Microsoft, Tesla and Nvidia.

The CFTC filing follows an earlier regulatory step by Coinbase Derivatives, which filed a Form 1-N with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Sept. 1 to register as a national securities exchange for the purpose of offering security futures. Together, the two filings trace a parallel regulatory path: the SEC registration concerns Coinbase Derivatives' standing as an exchange venue for security futures, while the CFTC submission seeks listing approval for the single-stock contracts themselves.

Coinbase already offers stock perpetual futures to eligible traders outside the United States. The company launched the product in March with contracts tracking major US stocks and indexes, including Apple and Nvidia. At the time, Coinbase said the products were unavailable to US persons but that it was working to expand the offering to additional regions, a stated goal the US filing would now advance domestically.

Perpetual futures have grown into one of the most heavily traded instruments across global cryptocurrency exchanges. Rather than settling at a fixed expiration date, perp positions are typically kept aligned with the spot price of the underlying asset through a recurring funding-rate mechanism, in which periodic payments are exchanged between traders holding long and short positions. Coinbase is the largest cryptocurrency exchange operating in the United States, and the CFTC filing would extend a crypto-native contract format to US equities under the regulator's derivatives oversight.

Source: Cointelegraph