Bitget, the world's largest Universal Exchange (UEX), has introduced TradFi Quanto Perpetual Futures, a new derivatives structure designed to give crypto-native traders exposure to non-USD-denominated stocks without requiring them to exchange USDT into the underlying asset's local currency.
The first contract, MINIMAXHKDUSDT, tracks Hong Kong-listed artificial intelligence company MiniMax. The product is available exclusively on Bitget and offers leverage of up to 20x.
The new contracts use the local currency of the underlying stock for price reference, while keeping the entire trading process denominated in USDT.
For Hong Kong-listed equities, the underlying price is quoted in HKD, while Japanese stocks would use JPY. However, traders post margin in USDT, pay funding fees in USDT and receive realized profits and losses in USDT.
The system effectively treats the numerical value of the local-currency price as equivalent to USDT at a 1:1 ratio. As a result, the contract is designed to track the price movement of the underlying stock without introducing a separate foreign exchange conversion step.
For example, if a trader opens a long position of 10 MINIMAXHKDUSDT contracts at 30 and closes the position at 50, the resulting profit would be 200 USDT, calculated as the 20-unit price difference multiplied by 10 contracts. The P&L is settled directly in USDT, with no need to convert the trader's funds into HKD.
"Quanto contracts are not new in crypto derivatives, but no major exchange has applied the structure to traditional financial assets until now," said Gracy Chen, CEO of Bitget. "From Pre-IPO access to US stock options, we are building a trading environment where crypto infrastructure serves global financial markets. The Quanto contracts remove the last barrier for global traders: currency conversion. Anyone holding USDT can now trade Hong Kong and other non-USD stocks as easily as they trade Bitcoin. This is convergence in practice which Bitget has been able to crack."
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Removing currency conversion barrier
The product is designed to address one of the practical challenges faced by crypto users seeking exposure to international equities.
A trader who wants to gain exposure to a Hong Kong-listed company through traditional markets would typically need access to the relevant brokerage infrastructure and, depending on the funding method, convert their capital into HKD.
This introduces an additional step and potentially exposes the investor to foreign exchange movements.
Bitget's Quanto Perpetual structure separates the stock's local-currency price reference from the currency used for trading and settlement. This allows users to maintain USDT as their trading currency while gaining directional exposure to non-USD-denominated equities.
The model could be particularly relevant as crypto exchanges expand beyond digital assets and increasingly compete to provide access to global financial markets.
TradFi perpetuals continue to grow
The launch comes as perpetual derivatives tied to traditional financial assets gain traction across the crypto exchange sector.
According to TokenInsight's Crypto Exchange Report Q2 2026, TradFi perpetuals were the fastest-growing segment of the crypto exchange market during the second quarter.
Monthly trading volume reportedly increased from approximately $52 billion in January to $268 billion in June, representing roughly a fivefold increase during the first half of the year.
Equity perpetuals were identified as a major driver of this growth, overtaking commodities as the primary source of expansion within the TradFi derivatives segment.
Bitget was among the fastest-growing platforms in the sector, generating approximately $69 billion in TradFi perpetual trading volume during Q2 and accounting for 11.01% of the market, according to the report cited by the exchange.
The Quanto Perpetual launch is the latest addition to Bitget's broader push to incorporate traditional financial markets into its Universal Exchange model.
The exchange has progressively expanded its range of products connecting crypto infrastructure with traditional assets. This has included tokenized stock perpetual contracts that provide synthetic exposure to publicly traded companies with USDT settlement and leverage of up to 100x.
Bitget also introduced CFD trading in late 2025, giving users access to markets covering equities, commodities and foreign exchange through stablecoin-based settlement.
In April 2026, the exchange launched IPO Prime, a Pre-IPO trading service powered by Republic that provides exposure to private companies before they potentially enter public markets. The service has included companies such as SpaceX among its available opportunities.
Bitget subsequently expanded its equity derivatives offering with U.S. stock options, supporting long call and long put strategies on eligible U.S.-listed companies alongside its existing crypto and CFD products.
The launch of TradFi Quanto Perpetuals extends this strategy to another part of the global equity market. Instead of limiting traders to U.S. dollar-denominated assets, the new structure is designed to make equities priced in currencies such as HKD and JPY accessible through a USDT-based trading environment.
For Bitget, the product reinforces its broader UEX strategy of bringing different asset classes into a single trading ecosystem. For crypto-native traders, it provides another way to express short-term views on international equities without managing a separate currency conversion process.
Dan Burgin
U.Today Editorial Team
