CME Sues CFTC: Argues that "Perpetual Contracts" Are Swaps

In a Complaint filed against the CFTC and its Chair, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange ("CME") asked a federal court to overturn an agency Order that let a rival exchange list cryptocurrency "perpetual contracts" as futures rather than as swaps. (See previous coverage).

In the Complaint, filed in the District Court for the District of Columbia, CME argued that perpetual contracts (agreements to exchange payments tracking a commodity's price, with no delivery and no expiration date) fit the Commodity Exchange Act's definition of a swap, and that the CFTC had long regulated them as swaps, including in enforcement actions. CME said that by approving KalshiEX's request to list a bitcoin perpetual as a future, the CFTC exempted the product from the registration, margin, and recordkeeping rules Congress imposed on swaps.

The CME said the Order was issued without public comment or reasoned decisionmaking, in violation of the Act, and that the agency had not addressed the more than 150 comments it received after seeking input on the question in 2025. The CME said Chair Michael Selig, currently the sole member of the CFTC, acted alone only one day after Kalshi applied, and that a policy statement accompanying the Order let any futures exchange self-certify similar crypto perpetuals without prior approval - as Kalshi had done more than a dozen times.