SEC Chairman Paul Atkins and CFTC Chairman Michael Selig addressed market structure, prediction markets and perpetual futures at an event on Tuesday.
Michael Selig, chairman of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), said the agency will soon discuss how to treat perpetual futures contracts for cryptocurrencies.
At a panel Tuesday hosted by the Milken Institute in Washington, Selig said the CFTC is working to achieve a “real, permanent future” in the United States “over the next month.”
The CFTC chairman is currently the only Senate-confirmed commissioner, with no indication as of Tuesday that US President Donald Trump will nominate someone to fill one of the agency’s four commissioner vacancies.
“The previous administration took a lot of these companies and liquidity offshore,” Selig said in a discussion with SEC Chairman Paul Atkins.
Selig added that the CFTC is working to provide guidance on prediction markets “in the near future.” He claimed in February that the agency has “exclusive jurisdiction” over the regulation of platforms that offer event contracts and has stayed against many state-level administrative actions against companies, including Kalshi and Polymarket.
related to: Can US Legislators Override Crypto Market Structure Before Mediation?
The market structure bill affects the SEC and CFTC
Atkins addressed concerns over the structure of the digital asset market moving through Congress, which some experts say has been effectively stalled amid discussions on ethics, fixed coin income and tokenized stocks. According to the SEC chairman, the agency needed “the sense of Congress written into law” to “guide the courts on where to go” and support the commission’s crypto efforts.
“You can only do without legal certainty from Congress,” Selig said in response to Atkins’ remarks.
As of Tuesday, the Senate Banking Committee had not set a hearing on the market structure bill. Last week, the White House held the latest in a series of talks with industry leaders about sustainable coin production, but it’s unclear whether those discussions will lead to legislative progress.
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