Yesterday the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) published a statement noting that many crypto perpetuals for the likes of Bitcoin and Ether would be considered to be contracts for differences (CFDs). Given the involvement of leverage, complexity and risk, ESMA stated that these products should result in a “narrow target market and a distribution strategy” that is consistent with that.
While the ESMA announcement explicitly mentioned crypto perpetuals, it was made the same day as Kraken launched perpetual futures for ten tokenized assets, xStocks, including for the Nasdaq and S&P indices, gold, and seven popular tech and crypto stocks.
Given ESMA’s view that there should be a narrow target market, it considers many promotions inappropriate, including mass marketing campaigns, initiatives targeting inexperienced investors, or any offering that explicitly targets all the exchange’s clients.
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