TL;DR
- Ondo Perps, an offshore perpetual futures platform for tokenized assets, sees a “huge opportunity” in the U.S. market, according to its CEO.
- David Wells warned that any onshore version would require a different settlement and clearing structure to comply with local regulatory rules.
- Since its July launch, the platform has accumulated around $14 billion in volume and surpassed $100 million in open interest.
Ondo Perps, the Panama-based offshore perpetual futures platform specializing in tokenized U.S. equities, equity ETFs and commodities, identifies a significant opening in the U.S. domestic market.
However, its CEO David Wells was clear: any local version would not replicate the model it currently operates for users outside the United States.
In an interview during an Ondo event in Seoul, South Korea, Wells stated that offering perpetual futures in the U.S. is a “huge opportunity” and that it “makes sense” to explore that expansion. At the same time, he warned that the product would have to be different from the one current users know: “Perps in the U.S. are structured somewhat differently from perp markets outside the U.S., and we’ll see how that evolves.”
Competing for the U.S. Market
Both regulators and private companies are evaluating how to incorporate perpetual futures into the U.S. market. In August, President Donald Trump indicated that the Commodity Futures Trading Commission was working to integrate Hyperliquid into the local market in a legal and regulated manner.
Since then, Kraken‘s parent company, Payward, announced plans to list Hyperliquid’s HIP-3 perpetual markets for eligible U.S. clients through Bitnomial Exchange and NinjaTrader Clearing, both regulated by the CFTC. Coinbase also filed its applications to launch perps on individual equities in the country.
Ondo Files Its Applications
Ondo Finance, for its part, submitted letters to the SEC and the CFTC this month arguing that perpetual contracts on U.S. equities fall within the category of security futures under the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. Wells noted that the contract structure could be similar in a local version, but that settlement and clearing would need to be adapted to regulatory requirements.
Ondo Perps, launched in July, allows users to use tokenized stocks as collateral, which Wells describes as a capital efficiency advantage over other platforms where collateral is locked up in stablecoins.
Recently, the platform enabled the buying and selling of 12 Ondo Stocks directly within its app, eliminating the need to manage positions across two separate venues. Wells anticipated that this availability will progressively extend to all Ondo Stocks.
