Kraken parent Payward brings onchain perpetuals to US via Hyperliquid

Payward, the parent company of Kraken, announces that it wants to offer onchain perpetual futures to US customers. To do so, the company is starting on Hyperliquid, via so-called HIP-3 markets: developer-deployed perpetual futures markets with access restrictions. The plans are subject to regulatory approval. At the time of writing, Hyperliquid stands at $78.02, up 1.4% in the past 24 hours.

In brief:

• Payward wants to become the first registered US exchange to offer onchain perpetual futures via Hyperliquid.
• CFTC-regulated subsidiaries Bitnomial and NinjaTrader Clearing bear the legal obligations.
• Only customers approved by both entities may trade.

First regulated US entity on Hyperliquid

According to Payward’s press release, several parties are already active on Hyperliquid offering builder-deployed perpetuals. One of them holds 98% of all open positions. To date, however, no registered US exchange or clearinghouse has set up a market there. Payward wants to be the first.

Co-CEO Arjun Sethi says that Payward holds the keys and bears the regulatory obligations. “We already offer all our own US perpetuals and now want to become active on Hyperliquid as well, with the customer first,” Sethi said.

The markets run on Hyperliquid’s public blockchain, where orders are matched and recorded. Bitnomial, Payward’s CFTC-regulated exchange and clearinghouse, acts as HIP-3 deployer and is responsible for setting up, managing and settling the contracts. NinjaTrader Clearing, a CFTC-registered futures commission merchant and part of Payward, manages customer accounts. Only users who have been accepted by NinjaTrader and are on the access lists of both NinjaTrader and Bitnomial can trade.

Perpetuals have been popular outside the US for years

Perpetual futures have been traded outside the United States since 2016. In 2025 alone, more than $85 trillion changed hands worldwide in this market segment, according to CoinGecko’s State of Crypto Perpetuals Report. For the US market, these products were long unavailable through regulated channels.

Hyperliquid has been active since 2023 and was named by CoinGecko as the most active onchain perpetuals environment of 2025. Data from DefiLlama shows that the platform processed more than $200 billion in volume over the past 30 days. Kraken is also already connected to the platform in another way, as can be seen in the collaboration around trading capabilities via X.

Broader rollout via open infrastructure

Payward sees Hyperliquid as the starting point of a broader strategy. The company later wants to apply the framework it has set up to other protocols, regions and products worldwide. Calvin Leyon, head of Onchain at Kraken, says that decentralised infrastructure can adapt to regulated markets and thus bring innovative products to more users.

Jon Pham, head of US derivatives at Payward, explains what it looks like for the customer: a US user opens a futures account with Payward’s registered broker and then trades new perpetual futures on Hyperliquid, settled through the same clearinghouse that already processes crypto perpetuals for US customers.

As of 30 June 2026, Payward has more than 6.6 million funded accounts and is active in more than 190 countries and territories. An independent accountant confirmed that customer assets are fully covered. The plans will take effect as soon as the regulator gives the green light.