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Key Takeaways
- OKX’s new pre-IPO perpetual futures let European traders speculate on OpenAI and Anthropic valuations with up to 10 times leverage, without granting ownership stakes.
- OKX joins Hyperliquid and Binance in offering similar pre-IPO products tied to the same private AI companies.
- OKX added 100 tokenized stocks and ETFs, including Nvidia, Alphabet and Palantir, for round-the-clock trading, with some tokens withdrawable to self-custody wallets.
Crypto exchange OKX said Thursday it has launched pre-IPO perpetual futures tied to OpenAI and Anthropic for European traders, letting eligible users speculate on the private artificial intelligence companies’ valuations with up to 10 times leverage.
The exchange also added 100 tokenized stocks and exchange-traded funds available for round-the-clock trading, expanding its push into markets historically limited to traditional exchange hours.
How Pre-IPO Perpetual Futures Work
Traders using OKX’s new products do not receive an ownership stake in OpenAI or Anthropic. Instead, they take a position on how each company’s valuation will move, with the ability to go long or short and amplify exposure using leverage of up to 10 times their initial position.
The structure addresses a specific gap for individual investors. OpenAI and Anthropic remain private companies, and shares in both typically change hands only through funding rounds or secondary markets that restrict who can participate. This leaves most retail investors with no direct way to gain exposure before either company goes public.
Pre-IPO perpetual futures offer traders a way to bet on valuation moves without meeting those access requirements, though the products remain a derivative instrument rather than a substitute for owning actual shares.
OKX Joins Hyperliquid And Binance In The Category
OKX is not the first crypto exchange to offer this kind of product. Hyperliquid already lists markets tied to OpenAI and Anthropic through its HIP-3 framework, and Binance offers its own pre-IPO perpetual contracts for both companies.
The expansion reflects broader competition among crypto exchanges to capture demand for assets that remain difficult for retail investors to access through traditional channels.
As more platforms list similar products tied to the same handful of prominent private companies, the category is becoming a competitive front among major exchanges rather than a niche offering unique to any single platform.
Tokenized Stock Expansion Adds 100 Names
Alongside the pre-IPO futures, OKX is making 100 stocks and exchange-traded funds available for trading around the clock, including Nvidia, Alphabet and Palantir, as well as the SPY and QQQ funds. The tokens track the price of the underlying security but do not confer actual share ownership or voting rights to holders.
Some of the tokenized products can be withdrawn from OKX and held in a self-custody wallet, giving users a degree of control over the tokens beyond what a standard brokerage account would typically allow.
The combination of round-the-clock tokenized equities and leveraged pre-IPO derivatives positions OKX to compete for traders seeking exposure to traditional and private markets without leaving a crypto-native trading environment.
Growth Tied To Europe’s MiCA Framework
OKX Europe CEO Erald Ghoos said demand for the exchange’s derivatives business has been accelerating. He said in a statement:
“We continue to see strong demand for our derivatives offering across Europe.”
According to the company, European trading volume in its X-Perps products has risen fourfold since the transition period under the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation, known as MiCA, ended in July.
That growth, cited directly by OKX, coincides with the exchange’s broader push to expand its product lineup for European users under the region’s newly finalized regulatory framework.
