Kalshi’s crypto perpetual futures generated more than $5.5 billion in trading volume in their first two weeks, according to the company. A trader now says a single repeated $5,500 trade size accounts for roughly half of its ETH volume.
The allegation rests on public trade data and on Kalshi’s own regulatory filings, which show fee terms for eligible members that can net to zero on a trade. The filings also bar rebates on wash trades, and no evidence has been published showing which accounts sit on either side of the disputed trades.
A trader posting on X as Beni (@beniduboss) alleged on September 20, 2026 that Kalshi “fakes their crypto volume,” and published an analysis on September 21 stating that ETH perp trades of about $5,500 made up 48% to 58% of all ETH perp notional volume across four trading windows between September 16 and September 20.
How the Dispute Began
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission approved Kalshi’s BTCPERP contract on May 29, 2026, making it the first CFTC-approved crypto perpetual futures product in the United States. Perpetual futures, or perps, are derivatives with no expiry date that let traders take leveraged positions on an asset’s price without owning it.
The dispute started as an exchange on X. IcoBeast (@icobeast), who works on Kalshi’s crypto business according to his X profile, which also states that his views are his own, asked Beni why anyone would wash trade when Kalshi charges trading fees. Wash trading is the practice of trading with oneself, or in coordination with another party, to create artificial volume.
Beni replied by citing a Kalshi filing with the CFTC, arguing that under its rebate terms makers receive 0.3 basis points and takers pay 0.3 basis points, for a combined net fee of zero.
What the Trade Data Shows
Beni’s first data point was a screenshot of Kalshi’s ETH perpetual market showing open interest of $3.1 million against 24-hour volume of $538.6 million. Open interest is the total value of positions still open. By his arithmetic, that volume equals the entire open interest changing hands roughly 174 times a day. The screenshot carries no UTC timestamp, and The Crypto Times has not independently verified the figures at a stated time.
He also posted a screenshot of Kalshi’s position leaderboard showing the largest open ETH position at $17,598 in total leveraged size. That screenshot is also undated.
His subsequent tables break the volume into trade sizes by window. Between 02:19 and 11:13 UTC on September 18, he reported $143.99 million in ETH perp notional volume, of which 58.46% came from trades of about $5,500. Across the other three windows, the share ranged from 47.20% to 51.55%.
The pattern does not appear in his BTC data. In a window between 16:23 and 23:17 UTC on September 20, covering $74.91 million in BTC perp notional volume, his table shows the largest single trade size, accounting for 18.71% of notional.
A second X user, Phin (@PhinTotten), reprocessed the same underlying files covering September 14 to 20. He reported 529,318 ETH perp trades totalling about $2.217 billion in notional volume, with roughly $1.230 billion, or 55.47%, in trades clustered around $5,500. His daily figures ranged from 38.32% on September 15 to 65.45% on September 14.
Phin’s analysis confirms the arithmetic on Beni’s dataset rather than drawing on an independent pull. Both users said the underlying trade records are available through Kalshi’s public API. A fixed, repeated order size can also be produced by an automated market-making or execution strategy, and trade size alone does not identify who is on either side of a trade.
What Kalshi’s Rebate Filing Says
Kalshi filed an update to its Temporary Perpetual Fee Rebate Program with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission on September 2, 2026, effective no earlier than 5:00 PM ET on September 16. The program existed before this update; the amended terms run until December 31, 2026.
Eligible participants are all of Kalshi’s Self-Clearing Members, firms that clear their own trades directly with the exchange rather than through a broker. Under the filed terms, crypto perp taker fees are rebated down to 0.3 basis points, or 0.003%, while maker fees are rebated so that makers net 0.3 basis points.
Kalshi’s own worked example in the filing shows the maker rebate exceeding the maker fee, meaning makers receive a net payment while takers pay a net fee of the same size. The filing states that Kalshi will adjust payments to prevent net-negative combined maker and taker fees on a per-trade basis, which sets the combined floor at zero.
The September 2 update also states that fees on trades involving self-matching, wash trading, or pre-arranged trading, including trades under inquiry for those practices, are excluded from rebates. It gives Kalshi’s Chief Regulatory Officer power to revoke a participant’s eligibility and commits the exchange to heightened surveillance of program participants.
The filing excludes any Kalshi affiliate from participating, citing conflict-of-interest rules. It also references a separate Spring 2025 Market Maker Program and states that where both programs apply, combined incentive payments will be capped at the total fees a participant has paid.
Under the amended terms, rebates are calculated at the end of September 2026 and paid by the 15th of the following month.
A Separate Volume Reward Program
A second filing, dated August 4, 2026, and signed by Chief Regulatory Officer Richard Heaslip, extended Kalshi’s Volume Incentive Program to futures contracts, effective on or after August 18, 2026. The program pays a fixed reward per market, divided among participants in proportion to their share of eligible volume.
The filing caps rewards at $0.005 per contract for event contracts. It does not state an equivalent per-contract cap for perpetual futures. Members with a Market Maker Agreement with Kalshi are excluded from that program.
Beni also pointed to a Bloomberg report from February 9, 2026, which said, citing unnamed people familiar with the matter, that Jump Trading would receive a fixed equity stake in Kalshi in exchange for providing liquidity. That report predates Kalshi’s Perps launch and concerns its event contracts. Beni argued the arrangement gives market makers an incentive to support Kalshi’s volume figures; neither Kalshi nor Jump has publicly confirmed the terms.
How Kalshi’s Staff Responded
IcoBeast (@icobeast), who works on Kalshi’s crypto business according to his X profile, which also states that his views are his own, disputed Beni’s claims in a post on September 20. He said the Artemis chart Beni first cited showed prediction market volume share rather than perps, and that Kalshi does not run rebates on crypto prediction markets.
He said Self-Clearing Member status is open to any firm meeting CFTC requirements under fair-access rules, and that exchanges including CME, Hyperliquid, and Binance run liquidity incentives. Hyperliquid’s published fee schedule lists maker rebates of 0.001% to 0.003%, and Binance’s USDⓈ-M Futures Maker Program lists rebates of 0.003% to 0.005%. On both venues, takers pay standard fees.
He wrote that it is “early days for perps” at Kalshi, and added that Kalshi, as a CFTC-regulated exchange, must file its incentive programs publicly. Beni responded that his claim concerned perps, not prediction markets, and has said he intends to publish further material.
On prediction markets, Beni separately alleged that Kalshi counts volume as the number of contracts traded but displays that figure with a dollar sign, so 100,000 contracts bought at 30 cents would show as $100,000 rather than the $30,000 paid. IcoBeast said the method of converting contracts to notional dollars is standard across prediction markets, including Polymarket, making the figures directly comparable.
Also Read: CME to Sue CFTC Over Kalshi’s Bitcoin Perpetual Futures
