WHY, AI, THE DEAL IS ACCELERATING TO CONCENTRATE ON FUTURES MARKETS
On March 3, Michael Selig, Chairman of the United States Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), stated at the Milken Institute's “Future of Finance” Congress that the CFTC would introduce in a few weeks a regulatory framework for a contract for the sustainability of encrypted currency, with the aim of gradually bringing this product, which was almost exclusively an offshore exchange-led product, back to the United States itself. This statement is a continuation of the ongoing developments in the United States market over the past year. In July 2025, Coinbase introduced CFTC-supervised, permanent futures products for retail users in the United States; in December 2025, Cboe launched Bitcoin and Ether's continuous futures products; and in March 2026, Coinbase further expanded its product lines to non-United States users, introducing stock renewals. As can be seen, the renewal of futures is gradually becoming the core infrastructure for the implementation of derivatives trading, and the United States is accelerating the completion of this component。
AI TRANSACTIONS ARE OFTEN PACKAGED AS A MORE INTELLIGENT WAY TO TRADE IN ENCRYPTED MONEY. BUT IF IT FOCUSES ON PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS, IT IS THE FUTURES MARKET THAT IS REALLY BETTER SUITED. FUTURES CONTRACTS NATURALLY HAVE MORE SYMMETRICAL STRUCTURAL FEATURES SUCH AS STANDARDIZATION, BOND-DRIVEN, MARKET-TO-MARKET TARGETING, AND MANY EMPTY JOBS, MAKING SYSTEMATIC IMPLEMENTATION EASIER TO LAND THAN SPOT MARKETS. THE LOGIC OF SPOT TRANSACTIONS TENDS TO BE INTERTWINED WITH THE OPERATIONAL PROBLEMS OF A RANGE OF NON-TRANSACTIONS, SUCH AS HOSTING, CLEARING, BORROWING AND SO FORTH, AND FUTURES REMOVE THESE BURDENS. IT IS NOT SURPRISING THAT FUNDS AND STRATEGIES FOR AUTOMATED TRANSACTIONS ARE INCREASINGLY CONCENTRATED IN DERIVATIVES MARKETS AND THAT SUSTAINABLE CONTRACTS ACCOUNT FOR THE VAST MAJORITY OF TRANSACTIONS FOR ENCRYPTED DERIVATIVES。
The bulk is moving faster from the documentary and signal copying stages to automated implementation. Those who used to copy the shouts in the Telegram group are starting to subscribe to trading robots, and some even start building their own systemic strategies. The standardization of bond mechanisms and contractual levels embedded in futures markets makes such a shift the easiest to actually land。
What the futures market gave the machine, it couldn't be delivered
A spot transaction implies that assets are held directly. Even in an exchange where rules are clear and prices are given priority, algorithms deal with a mix of hosting, settlement and borrowing mechanisms that vary considerably depending on the platform (if you want to be empty)。
Futures contracts remove these links from the trade logic. Based on a bond, day-to-day focus on the city, and space-rich natural symmetry, the same strategy can be expressed directly in both directions. The warehouse size became an adjustable parameter linked to the bond, and the risk limit corresponded directly to the bond threshold. Models are finer and more clearly defined in terms of finer particle size in wind control and warehouse management。
For the automation strategy, this discrepancy directly changed the way risk management, warehouse calculation and implementation are carried out. The regulatory framework views bonds and market-to-day targeting as the basic mechanisms of futures markets, as evidenced by standardization provisions, centralized liquidation, bonds as performance guarantees and daily settlements. These mechanisms provide futures markets with liquidity and scalability, while also making them easier to transform into rules-based trading systems。
There is no expiry date for the renewal of the contract. The financial rate (usually settled every eight hours) assumed the anchor function by pulling the price of the contract back to the spot. The rate is based on the recent price difference between futures and spot. The funding rate is an additional state variable for a systematic strategy. It reflects, in real time, the slopes and leverage distribution of both sides. This signal is not available in the spot market。
Only derivatives have signals
Data layers generated by futures markets are not available in spot order books. This is the most undervalued reason for automated trading in favour of derivatives。
The base differential (the difference between the price of the spot and the future) and the financial rate (the multiple cash flows paid regularly by both parties in the contract of renewal) are important signals in determining the degree of deviation from the derivatives market and the direction of leverage. They told the model how far the derivatives deviate from the bottom asset and which direction the leverage leans in. The model can use this deviation as a feature input, a risk control signal, or both。
The holdout provided information on the intentions of the second tier of the market. When successive contracts dominate the futures of bitcoin, both in terms of trade and hold, the embedded warehouse information in derivatives is the highest market-wide density. Microstructure models, liquidation cascades, emotional proxy indicators tend to emerge first in futures markets, as participants express their judgement in futures by leveraging funds. For models, the most dense places for signals are often the ones worth learning。
The same applies at the implementation level. Contract specifications for futures order book are standardized, rules for alignment are clear, and lined order book data are naturally suitable for machine learning. Implementation optimization, order book modelling, and the application scenes that these machines learn live with market structures in derivative markets. Put it in the off-the-shelf structure, it's more like a later superseding subsidiary capacity。
Why does the price make sense for automated transactions
Another advantage that is often underestimated is that futures usually dominate price discovery。
Studies of the dynamics of spot and futures prices have repeatedly shown that, under conventional market conditions, futures contribute most of the shares found in prices. When arbitrage signals appear, this proportion will expand. In the encrypted currency market, standard price discovery indicators point to futures dominance. The deviation between futures and spots predicts the subsequent movement of spots, which in turn does not work. Information is usually reflected in futures and transmitted to the spot, with time lags between them。
The foreign exchange market provides a useful reference. In periods of less transparency in the spot market, futures show a disproportionate amount of information, sometimes several minutes ahead of the spot. With increased spot transparency, the share of information gradually flows back to the spot, and market design and transparency determine where informed funds are pooled. Futures trading places, as centralized, rule-driven competitive environments with machine-readable transparency, naturally attract such funds. For systematic models, the mapping relationship between the state of the market and the trading action is more clean where the signals are concentrated。
YES, AI. BETTER THAN SAFER FOR EVERYONE
Futures compressed time. Leverage is also magnified. The bond is a performance guarantee and, when the account is below the maintenance level, the trader is required to add a change bond. The contract itself is a highly leveraged instrument in the context of an encrypted contract for perpetuity, and the details of the protection of the order (e.g. when the price difference between the latest contract price and the reasonable base price exceeds the threshold, the commission will be rejected after the loss or loss triggers) directly affect the performance of any robot operating at the site。
Several things are uncompromising for automated systems. The assumption of a slide point is conservative, operation monitoring is continuous and the sensory profile of the bond model is clear. A warehouse slot may have been flattened in the presence of funds elsewhere in the platform, depending on whether the warehouse was to be run over or in full. These risks do not disappear because the implementer is an algorithm. Systems designed around them can frame risks. Neglecting their systems can eventually reverse the risks of magnification。
WHAT IS REALLY NEEDED IS STRUCTURES, OF WHICH FORECASTING CAPACITY IS ONLY PART. THE SO-CALLED STRUCTURE IS HOW IT WORKS WHEN MARKETS ARE OUT OF ORDER。
What does that mean
The alignment of the automation strategy with the futures market is creating a new type of raw futures trading platform. Such platforms have been built around derivative infrastructure from the outset, with automation capabilities embedded in trading structures。
One BullEx is an example of this kind of thinking. Its 300 SPARTANS operate directly on its own futures infrastructure, with both net values and historical performance being traceable and auditable. OneALPHA translates natural language input into a deployable futures strategy that allows non-code users to enter into systematic transactions. If the market itself already provides the standardization, signals and risk architecture required for a systematic strategy, the platform should be built around it from the first day。
MORE IMPORTANT THAN ANY SINGLE PLATFORM IS THE OVERALL TREND. AI PRIMARY TRANSACTIONS ARE MOST LIKELY TO MATURE IN FUTURES MARKETS, AS FUTURES ARE NATURALLY STRUCTURED FOR IMPLEMENTATION。
AI WILL CONTINUE TO EVOLVE, BUT THE DISCIPLINE IT REALLY NEEDS IS NOT NEW. THE FUTURES MARKET WAS BORN OUT OF THIS DISCIPLINE。
