Jeff Yan stated that Hyperliquid's ultimate goal is to carry all financial operations.

Written by: Vicky Ge Huang, The Wall Street Journal

Translated by: Luffy, Foresight News

On a Saturday in February, when hedge fund commodity trader Vala Zeinali's phone lit up with the news of President Trump's announcement of airstrikes on Iran, he immediately opened the Hyperliquid website.

As a decentralized crypto trading platform, Hyperliquid operates year-round and around the clock. This year, it has already become the go-to venue for Wall Street short-term traders. Every weekend when U.S. stock markets are closed, investors can build or liquidate positions in advance, locking in profits before the market opens.

Back in early 2026, predicting that geopolitical conflicts might erupt in the Middle East, Zeinali invested a four-figure sum in oil derivatives. After the airstrike news broke, oil prices soared, and he promptly closed his position on Hyperliquid, achieving a hefty 243% return.

"At that time, I was particularly glad, as typically, such geopolitical good news would lead to a price drop before the U.S. market opens on Monday," Zeinali said. "Fortunately, I was able to exit in time, and most of my positions were successfully cashed out."

Increasing numbers of traditional finance and crypto traders are flocking to the platform, trading a wide array of assets: Bitcoin, S&P 500, crude oil, and stars like SpaceX that have not yet gone public. The primary focus is on perpetual contracts, a type of derivative with no expiration date, available for trading at all hours, and allowing users to amplify profits and losses with high leverage.

At an event, Hyperliquid's founder Jeff Yan stated that the platform's ultimate goal is to carry all financial operations

Hyperliquid was founded three years ago by Jeff Yan, a quantitative trader at former high-frequency trading firm Hudson River Trading. The collapse of FTX inspired him: the crypto market desperately needs a high-performance trading system where users can manage their own assets.

"Self-custody is not an empty academic concept, but a fundamental need for users," Jeff Yan stated during an interview. "After FTX's incident, more users should pay attention to this point; the core essence is that assets must be in one's own hands."

The company behind Hyperliquid has only 11 employees. According to Blockworks Research, the platform, along with its supporting public chain, generated approximately $800 million in revenue last year; the native token HYPE has increased over 100% since its launch at the end of 2024, with a current market capitalization of about $16 billion.

The rapid rise of Hyperliquid is a microcosm of the accelerated integration of traditional finance and the crypto market. The perpetual contracts linked to U.S. stocks and commodities have firmly captured the attention of Wall Street funds.

Recently, Eric Vishria, a general partner at venture capital firm Benchmark, shared a picture on the X platform showing a banker monitoring perpetual futures prices linked to AI chip manufacturer Cerebras. Earlier this year, S&P Dow Jones' authorized partner Trade [XYZ] launched a perpetual product linked to the S&P 500 index on Hyperliquid, which has also become one of the platform's popular contracts.

A significant amount of capital is betting on the IPO prospects of unlisted companies; according to Hyperdash data, the cumulative trading volume of SpaceX's perpetual contracts on Hyperliquid has reached $280 million.

Currently, U.S. domestic users are still unable to use the platform compliantly, but the situation may change. Last Friday, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) introduced a new regulatory framework allowing licensed domestic platforms to launch perpetual contracts; simultaneously, it approved Kalshi to launch Bitcoin perpetual products, and U.S. users of Coinbase can also access its global perpetual contract products through affiliated entities.

Perpetual contracts come with high leverage and high-risk attributes, where price fluctuations can exponentially amplify profits and losses. For example, on October 10 last year, when Trump suddenly announced a 100% tariff increase on China, the market crashed violently, with the total market leverage liquidation amount exceeding $19 billion, with Hyperliquid accounting for $10 billion alone.

Jeff Yan stated that the actual losses across the industry are far higher than $19 billion, and Hyperliquid is counted separately because the platform's liquidation data is fully transparent, and the system operated normally even under extreme conditions, while multiple competing platforms experienced outages and could not operate normally.

Benjamin Schiffrin, head of securities policy at financial regulatory organization Better Markets, issued a warning: "The structure of perpetual contracts is complex, and even seasoned financial practitioners find it difficult to fully grasp; currently, risk disclosures for retail investors are severely lacking, and this combination conceals significant risks."

Even with restrictions, traders in the U.S. and banned regions still participate in trading through VPNs. The key attraction for them is that the platform does not require real-name verification, contrasting sharply with the stringent account opening due diligence from traditional brokers. However, the platform's user agreement explicitly prohibits U.S. users from participating and forbids circumventing restrictions using VPNs.

A simple and user-friendly interface, a rich variety of traded assets, and a strong community atmosphere are another significant advantage for retaining users on the platform.

Pascal Lin, a trader from Geneva, Switzerland, entered the scene at the end of 2023 and quickly became an active user. What impressed him most was that users could directly provide product feedback to founder Jeff Yan and the team in the Discord community.

"The sense of participation is strong, as if I am also involved in building the product," Pascal, who also manages ARES Capital Management's proprietary trading business, mainly trading HYPE and crude oil perpetual contracts, said. He previously accurately captured the crude oil bull market, with prices soaring from $67/barrel to nearly $100/barrel.

He is addicted to Hyperliquid, even setting up real-time price alerts on his Apple Watch, admitting that he does not recommend ordinary traders to imitate him. "I wake up any time at night, and I can just open the app and check HYPE prices with one click."

He is not the only enthusiastic user. The platform's unique community culture is at the core of its traffic. On the X platform, users habitually include Hyperliquid at the end of their posts, regardless of the topic. Many users choose the green jacketed smiling cat Hypurr as their social media avatar. In addition to playing with meme jokes, third-party developers continue to build market tools, data dashboards, and other supporting ecosystems.

Lawrence Wu, co-founder of Hyperdash, stated: "I believe the reason it has such a large community is that it attempts to realize the original vision of cryptocurrency—a system led by elites that does not require permission. This is very idealistic."

Jeff Yan stated that Hyperliquid's ultimate goal is to integrate all financial resources. Hyperliquid's next planned step is to enter the fields of prediction markets and options trading; its first batch of contracts tracking Bitcoin prices has generated millions of dollars in trading volume since its launch in early May.