Globally, perpetual futures account for the vast majority of crypto derivatives volume, yet U.S. traders have historically had limited access due to regulatory restrictions.
Kraken recently entered the U.S. regulated derivatives market through its acquisitions of NinjaTrader and Bitnomial, giving it access to futures commission merchant, exchange and clearing licenses regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). The company expects to launch perpetual futures on Kraken Pro in the coming weeks.
Palmer said broader institutional adoption will likely take time, drawing a comparison to the launch of spot bitcoin ETFs in January 2024.
“When you take further steps back in the asset management chain, then you have investment committees. There could be more additional governance, depending on the entity type,” he said. “Those will typically require them to move a little bit slower.”
He added that this was the “same thing we saw with the bitcoin ETFs. We saw retail, we saw sophisticated customers really enter that market very quickly, and then we slowly started to see investment advisors, asset managers enter the space in a trailing fashion because they had to go through their own due diligence and their own corporate governance structures.”
“I think we will see the same thing for perps,” he said.
