SEC and CFTC Take the Wheel on Crypto Regulation
Following the recent defeat of the Clarity Act, which failed to advance in the Senate, US regulators are aggressively moving forward with their own market frameworks. On Thursday, the Securities and Exchange Commission issued a five-year conditional exemption allowing tokenized National Market System (NMS) stocks to trade on permissioned automated market makers (AMMs). Simultaneously, Commodity Futures Trading Commission staff opened introducing-broker relief to passive software.
The CFTC is also bypassing the stalled Congress by advancing its own rulemaking. On September 17, the agency submitted RIN 3038-AF80, titled "Regulation Crypto Asset Transactions and Regulation Crypto Asset Markets," to the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs at the prerule stage.
Kalshi Faces 'Fake Volume' Allegations
In the derivatives sector, prediction and futures platform Kalshi is facing public scrutiny. A critic on X alleged that the platform is inflating trading volumes in its ether perpetual futures, specifically flagging a series of identical $5,500 trades. Traders monitoring these types of market irregularities and open interest data often utilize resources like predictionmarketstools.com to track volume anomalies across platforms.
Coinbase Seeks Single-Stock Perps Amid Macro Sell-off
Meanwhile, Coinbase Derivatives has filed for CFTC approval to list single-stock perpetual futures on Apple, Tesla, and Nvidia. The proposed contracts would offer US traders 24/5 leveraged exposure with hourly funding, clearing through Nodal Clear.
These aggressive market expansions arrive during a broader macro tightening. Following August producer prices coming in at 0.4%, rate hike odds reached 64% as the 30-year Treasury yield passed every close of the past five years. The shifting macroeconomic landscape triggered a broad crypto sell-off with 103 of the 125 largest non-stablecoin tokens trading lower, pushing Bitcoin down to $77,120 while Brent crude topped $106.