Kraken is rolling out perpetual futures trading for eligible US clients on its Kraken Pro platform, marking what the exchange describes as the first CFTC-regulated perpetual contracts available to American traders. The product will support nine major tokens at launch, including BTC, ETH, SOL, XRP, ADA, LINK, DOGE, LTC, and AVAX.
Perpetual futures are the single most traded derivative product in the digital asset world. Global perps trading volume exceeded $60 trillion in 2025. And until now, nearly all of that action has happened offshore, outside the reach of US regulators.
What Kraken built, and what it cost
Kraken’s solution was to buy its way in. The exchange acquired NinjaTrader for $1.5 billion and Bitnomial for up to $550 million, bringing the total tab to roughly $2.05 billion. NinjaTrader brought futures commission merchant (FCM) capabilities, while Bitnomial operates as a CFTC-designated contract market (DCM).
The product itself works like perpetual contracts everywhere else. No expiration date, continuous pricing, and an eight-hour funding rate mechanism that keeps the contract price tethered to the underlying spot market. The difference is that this version operates under CFTC oversight, which is a first for perps in the US market.
