CME Group signage above the former Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) trading pit in Chicago, Illinois, United States, Thursday, November 13, 2025.
Christophe Dilts | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Stock exchange stocks fall after regulatory approval of perpetual futures contracts as Bitcoin has sparked concerns that a new wave of trading products could pose an existential threat to Wall Street.
CME Groupknown for its derivatives and futures trading platforms, fell more than 3% during Tuesday’s session. The stock is down about 9% over the past two days and is poised for its biggest weekly decline since 2020.
Cboe Global Marketsan exchange and derivatives network, plunged 8% in Tuesday trading. This brought its losses for this week to more than 16%, which is also its biggest weekly decline since 2020.
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CME group, 5 days
Parent company of the New York Stock Exchange Intercontinental exchange slipped more than 3% on Tuesday and is down 5% for the week. Nasdaq shares fell more than 6% during the session, pushing the stock into the red since the start of the week.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission last week perpetual futures contracts approved – a type of future-like contract with no expiration date – for bitcoin trading on Kalshi. This tool, known as “perps”, is popular among overseas retail traders.
Investors fear that the CFTC will then give the green light for other asset classes to trade via perpetual futures contracts. That could increase competition for traditional exchanges that have long dominated Wall Street.
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Cboe, 5 days
“The concern is that criminals could shift to equity products and potentially replace S&P CME/CBOE products,” Barclays analyst Ben Budish told clients in a note published Tuesday.
“Shoot first”Budish said perpetual futures could pose a competitive challenge for some products aimed at retail investors. But the analyst said there are already comparable offerings in the United States that have not significantly changed the way retail investors trade so far.
Despite the recent pullback, Ashish Sabadra, an analyst at RBC, said competitive risk can be managed because there are “fundamental” differences between perpetual futures mechanisms and those offered by exchanges. Sabadra said perpetual futures could face leverage limits from clearinghouses to mitigate risk and institutional interest is limited.
In other words: Investors are “shoot first and ask questions later,” said Jay Woods, chief market strategist at Freedom Capital Markets.
“There [may be] deserves the news for a minor setback,” Woods said. “But this seems like a major overreaction to me.”
To be sure, perpetual futures aren’t the only challenge FX providers face in traders’ eyes, according to David Krakauer, vice president of portfolio management at Mercer Advisors.
Investors are concerned that fintech companies and other platforms could begin offering products that rival those on traditional exchanges, Krakauer said. Additionally, he said shareholders of these stocks are wondering whether the rise of prediction markets will shift attention away from conventional asset classes.
A booming asset classTarek Mansour, CEO of Kalshi, allayed investors’ concerns by saying the prediction market platform aims to gain approval and then develop perpetual futures offerings that go beyond just bitcoin.
“Kalshi is starting with Bitcoin perpetual futures, and then we’ll expand from there,” Mansour said Monday on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street.”
Criminals see volume of more than $90 trillion annually, making it “one of the most important asset classes on the planet today,” Mansour said. This is being done without the participation of US investors due to regulatory hurdles, despite interest in the products, he added.
“The demand has been very clear for a few years in America,” Mansour said. “The people want it here. The institutions want it here.”
Robin Hood CEO Vlad Tenev said Tuesday that the potential to bring criminals to the United States was “very attractive” in an interview with CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street.”
Tenev said U.S. traders should be able to use perpetual futures without going through unregulated platforms accessed by virtual private networks, also known as VPNs. US crypto investors have been known to trade perpetual futures for Bitcoin for years. via offshore accounts.
— CNBC’s Davis Giangiulio, Sean Conlon and Tanaya Macheel contributed to this report.
