Robinhood and Lighter execs say perps, not CFDs, are the future for Wall Street

Why onchain finance is converging with Wall Street

Speaking at DAS Singapore, Robinhood's Johann Kerbrat and Lighter's Vlad Novakovski told host Felix that traditional finance and crypto infrastructure are converging faster than expected. Novakovski, a former Citadel employee, said the shift is driven by two unlocks: the technology has matured enough to offer trading at institutional speed while remaining verifiable, and regulators, particularly the CFTC and SEC, "have really adapted a lot."

Kerbrat said Robinhood's experience backs this up concretely: on its stock tokens, "more than 70% of the volume" happens outside normal exchange hours, mostly weekends and overnight, which he said shows global demand for round-the-clock access. He noted Robinhood launched 24/5 trading a few years ago on a limited set of tickers due to thin liquidity but has seen demand grow steadily since.

On liquidity concerns for 24/7 markets, Novakovski argued that DeFi's AMM model can supplement thin order books when sophisticated market makers step back, for instance during weekends or major news events, allowing trading to continue even if spreads widen temporarily.

Perpetuals gain momentum over CFDs, and move into real-world assets

Both guests said perpetual futures, a primitive invented in crypto, are becoming mainstream because they let users go long or short with leverage and cross-margin across a portfolio. Kerbrat contrasted this with CFDs:

"it's a clear order book... a CFD is where they incorporate a spread and they really making it more advantageous for the broker than for the customer."

He added that Robinhood's Lighter-powered perps product inside Robinhood Wallet already supports crypto, commodities, and will extend to single stocks and options.

Novakovski described perps as "an idea whose time has finally come" for many markets, though he said they aren't a universal fix — compute markets, for example, may need dated futures because infrastructure firms have specific hedging timelines, while other markets suit options better. He said Lighter aims to be infrastructure allowing all these product types to trade from the same balance sheet.

On real-world assets, Novakovski flagged pre-IPO perpetuals as a particularly tricky case, citing unresolved questions about which regulator oversees them, whether to list by implied market cap or share price, and how to settle contracts if an IPO never happens. Kerbrat said Robinhood sees stock tokens being used as collateral so users can open perp positions without triggering a taxable sale.

US regulatory path and Robinhood Chain's early results

Kerbrat said Robinhood, with 27 million funded US accounts, had hoped for a unified federal framework from the SEC and CFTC covering all 50 states, which did not materialize, but called recent CFTC and SEC proposals a major improvement compared to "four or five years ago." He said Robinhood is pushing regulators to avoid a "worse version of perps" with clearinghouses that settle less frequently than onchain alternatives, which settle every few seconds.

Novakovski said Lighter is "pretty far along" working with the CFTC on bringing onchain perps to US customers, crediting CFTC leadership for engaging deeply with how blockchains and L2s like Robinhood Chain work. He said one unresolved technical question is how auto-deleveraging (ADL) fits into traditional clearinghouse waterfall models.

On Robinhood Chain, Kerbrat said the network is nearing its 100th day and has seen strong engagement once friction was removed, particularly around composable stock tokens and native perps integration via Lighter. He said expansion is limited to select markets for now but growth should accelerate once perps and stock tokens reach the US and other currently blocked regions. Novakovski added that because Lighter's core and Robinhood Chain versions share the same underlying Ethereum base, capital can move between jurisdictions far faster than in traditional finance, where rebalancing "you have to wait like three days."