TL;DR:
- Binance holds nearly half of the weekly perpetuals volume tied to traditional assets, which grew from $4.5 billion to $28 billion.
- 62% of bStocks volume in July occurred outside U.S. regular trading hours, compared to the 89.2% that remains within the normal session.
- Nasdaq and NYSE are moving toward a 23×5 schedule, though roughly 53 weekly hours would still see no U.S. exchange open.
Binance already operates where traditional markets have yet to reach. Although Nasdaq and the New York Stock Exchange are moving toward extended trading sessions under a 23×5 model, the platform offers uninterrupted access to products linked to various traditional markets, whose data shows growing global demand to trade outside New York hours.
According to Binance Research, 80.7% of the weekly calendar falls outside regular U.S. equity trading hours, yet that period accounts for just 10.8% of volume in July. The explanation is structural: the U.S. stock market remains dominated by institutional players who concentrate their activity where liquidity and regulatory protections are strongest.
Binance: A Demand That Trading Hours Cannot Solve
Shunyet Jan, Head of Exchange & Trading at Binance, argues that extending hours is not enough to create a truly continuous market. “The demand has existed for a long time, but for major exchanges to adapt they need to make deep changes,” he stated. Those changes involve not only the exchanges themselves, but also clearinghouses, banks and market makers.
The crypto market, by contrast, was designed from the outset to compete internationally without interruption. Bitcoin, for example, created a structural incentive for every platform to remain available at all times, something traditional equities never faced with the same competitive pressure.
The Advantage of Operating 24/7
The data reflects that contrast. Perpetuals linked to TradFi assets accounted for 37% of total perpetuals volume on Binance in August. In a recent 24-hour window, they occupied 10 of the 15 contracts with the highest volume. SNDK even surpassed the BTC-USDT pair during that period.
More than 90% of Direct Stocks and bStocks users come from emerging markets, where access to international exchanges has historically involved greater complications and higher costs. That user profile also determines what gets traded: semiconductors, artificial intelligence and chipmakers receive the bulk of attention, far removed from the typical U.S. portfolio.
The 23×5 model will still leave roughly 53 weekly hours without trading on U.S. exchanges. Eliminating that gap requires the entire financial infrastructure, including the banking system, to operate continuously. In the crypto ecosystem, stablecoins and instant settlement already resolve that dependency.
