Coinbase, Kalshi and Kraken's parent tell a New York court the CFTC was right to clear never-expiring futures on single stocks

Six crypto and trading firms have lined up behind the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in the lawsuit challenging its approval of never-expiring futures on individual stocks. Coinbase, Kalshi, Payward (the parent of Kraken), DRW Holdings, Jump Trading and Paradigm asked the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on Monday for permission to file a friend-of-the-court brief, The Block reports.

The case was brought last week by the Capital Markets Alliance Association, a group whose members include Cboe and Citadel Securities, after the CFTC let Coinbase, Kalshi and Payward list single-stock perpetual futures. The group says that because these contracts never expire, they are security-based swaps that cannot trade on CFTC-regulated exchanges.

The firms' brief says the only question is whether the products are "security futures" under the Commodity Exchange Act, and argues that they are: each is tied to a single stock, and the law does not require a set expiry date. It adds that the products fall under joint CFTC and SEC oversight, including safeguards against manipulation, and that reclassifying the contracts would push trading overseas. Coinbase Vice Chairman Ryan VanGrack said that the U.S. "should lead, not cede, this space."

A ruling that upholds the approvals would help the firms offer or expand the products in the U.S., The Block notes.