CFTC

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission regulates US derivatives markets, and treats Bitcoin and several other digital assets as commodities rather than securities. That distinction puts it in a long-running jurisdictional overlap with the SEC, and makes it the deciding authority over crypto futures, perpetuals and the prediction markets now trading event contracts at scale.

What we track on this desk

• Enforcement. Actions against unregistered derivatives venues and fraud cases, linked to the filing.
• Product approvals. Contract self-certifications and the emergency powers the Commission can use to stay them.
• Prediction markets. Event contracts and the litigation over whether they are gaming or derivatives — currently the most active front.
• Jurisdictional questions. Where CFTC authority ends and SEC authority begins, which legislation keeps trying to settle.
• Registered venues. Designated contract markets and clearing organisations serving crypto.

How to read a CFTC story here

Self-certification is routinely misreported as approval. A venue can list a contract by certifying it complies, without the Commission having blessed anything — and the Commission can later stay it, which is a different event from a rejection. Our coverage names the mechanism rather than compressing all of it into “approved”.

The jurisdictional overlap invites confident summaries that the filings do not support. Where the SEC and CFTC positions on an asset genuinely conflict, that conflict is the story, and it carries a Disputed label rather than a chosen winner.

Where to go next

See the Regulation desk for the wider picture, or the Verification Center for how publishers are counted.