ICE CEO Jeffrey Sprecher said the company does not view Hyperliquid as merely a threat, but is engaging with the crypto trading platform to study its 24/7 operations and perpetual contracts design, indicating that traditional exchanges are beginning to take on-chain derivatives markets more seriously.
ICE says it is in communication with them.
Speaker said at Bernstein’s Annual Strategy Conference that ICE and Hyperliquid are learning about each other’s operations. ICE aims to understand how crypto platforms support 24/7 trading and perpetual contracts with no expiration date, while also introducing the regulated market framework to the other side.
Hyperliquid has been rapidly expanding in the crypto derivatives market. Its core product is perpetual contracts, allowing traders to maintain positions based on asset price movements without the need to settle at a fixed date, as with traditional futures.
Compete for similar products in compliant markets
Speaker stated that ICE has raised questions with regulators: if similar products are already actively traded on crypto platforms, why can't regulated U.S. exchanges offer comparable products under clear rules? ICE seeks a more level competitive playing field between compliant markets and existing crypto venues.
This change has quickly gained momentum. Last Friday, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) approved the prediction market platform Kalshi to launch bitcoin perpetual futures, signaling that regulated U.S. platforms are beginning to adopt such products. On the same day, Coinbase also announced that its CFTC-regulated futures business now enables U.S. institutional clients to access global liquidity for crypto options and perpetual contracts.
The SpaceX contract serves as an observation sample.
The speaker also mentioned that SpaceX-related perpetual contracts could serve as a short-term case study. Market participants and regulators will observe whether derivative prices formed before the company’s official IPO influence its subsequent listing valuation.
According to Bloomberg data, the daily trading volume of perpetual contracts betting on SpaceX’s potential IPO price has averaged nearly $18 million over the past two weeks, indicating that some price discovery is occurring ahead of the traditional IPO process.
Some market participants believe that such transactions reflect a growing shift toward cryptocurrency infrastructure for expressing valuations and hedging risks related to private companies. Previously, these opportunities were largely accessible only to venture capitalists and institutional investors, but on-chain derivatives platforms are now opening up access to a broader range of market participants.
Additional information: The CFTC stated that other similar products, aside from Bitcoin perpetual futures, still require individual review.