The world's largest derivatives marketplace, the CME Group, is officially taking the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to court over allowing perpetual futures to trade in the United States.
On Thursday, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc., or CME, sued the CFTC and its chair, Michael Selig, accusing the agency of suddenly changing its course.
"With one stroke of his pen, the Chairman overrode Congress’s definition of the term 'swap' and circumvented the regulatory regime Congress required for that form of derivative," according to the complaint.
The CFTC approved the first perpetual futures for Kalshi and Coinbase last month, opening the door for those assets to trade in the U.S. for the first time.
Perpetuals, or perps, are a type of futures contract that don't have an expiration date and allow people to bet on the price movement of assets without owning them directly. They've become increasingly popular in crypto derivatives trading.
