Perp DEX: New and old competition: Hyperliquid welcomes tens of billions of yuan to relieve pressure, and new platforms use incentives to grab traffic

The competition in the Perpetual Decentralized Exchange (Perp DEX) market is intensifying, marked by a significant divergence between the established leader and emerging challengers.

Hyperliquid's Challenge: The leading platform, Hyperliquid, faces potential headwinds from a massive token unlock starting November 29th. Over 24 months, $10.8 billion worth of HYPE tokens will be gradually released, creating estimated monthly selling pressure of $450 million. In response, a proposal to reduce the total HYPE supply by 45% has been introduced to stabilize the token's economics.
Rise of New Platforms: Emerging platforms like Aster, Lighter, and edgeX are rapidly gaining market share through aggressive incentive mechanisms, such as airdrops and points programs. Data shows their trading volumes have surged by over 140% in recent months, while Hyperliquid's market share has declined from 49.3% to 38.1% over 90 days.
Market Health Indicators: Analysis of the Open Interest to Volume ratio reveals different user behaviors. Hyperliquid shows a high ratio (287%), indicating healthy user engagement with long-term positions. In contrast, platforms like Aster have a very low ratio (12%), suggesting their volume surge is primarily driven by short-term incentive hunting rather than organic user retention.
Overall Growth: Despite the shifting market shares, the Perp DEX sector is experiencing massive growth, with total daily trading volume increasing over 530% since the beginning of the year to exceed $43 billion. The key challenge for all platforms is converting short-term, incentive-driven traffic into long-term, sustainable user activity.

By Nancy, PANews

On September 22nd, a special "esports exhibition match" took place at a side event for the KBW 2025 Summit in South Korea. Contract players gave a 10-minute demonstration of leveraging decentralized contract platforms to achieve 100x leverage. Several emerging platforms, including Lighter, edgeX, and GRVT, competed on stage. On September 23rd, the founder of Hyperliquid, who had previously made rare public appearances, appeared at the KBW venue, and was surrounded by many Hyper fans.

Right now, the competition in the Perp DEX track is fierce.

While leading platform Hyperliquid faces potential headwinds from massive token unlocking, new competitors like Aster, Lighter, and edgeX are leveraging incentives and wealth-creation strategies to rapidly attract users and reshape the market. Driven by the complex dynamics of technology, capital, and attention, this sector is seeing further growth potential.

Tens of billions of dollars in selling pressure are imminent, and the supply reduction proposal has sparked heated discussion in the community.

Hyperliquid's rise is not only due to its efficient on-chain trading experience and low costs, but also to its early strategy of leveraging price performance to attract users and capital. This strategy not only allowed Hyperliquid to dominate the Perps DEX market for a long time, but also gave it a significant lead in on-chain trading volume and user engagement, leaving its competitors far behind.

However, the impending massive token unlock has sparked market concerns. Over a month ago, BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes publicly expressed his bullishness on HYPE, claiming the token could achieve a 126-fold increase, potentially reaching $25.8 billion in annualized revenue by 2028. At the time, Hyperliquid's revenue was projected at $5.1 billion. However, Hayes cashed out his entire holdings on September 22nd, citing the significant pressure HYPE faces from its upcoming unlock. Despite this, he maintained the 126-fold opportunity, considering 2028 is still a long way off.

In fact, according to Tokenomist data, starting November 29th, 238 million Hype tokens from core contributors will be linearly unlocked over the next 24 months. Currently, the unlocked value reaches $10.8 billion, potentially facing approximately $450 million in selling pressure each month. However, based on the approximately $110 million in HYPE repurchases in August, this is far from enough to cover the potential selling pressure.

Hayes Family Office Fund Maelstrom stated in a post that this is Hyperliquid's "first real test," and that monthly releases pose a significant risk to HYPE's price stability. "Imagine you're a Hyperliquiquid developer. You've put in years of hard work, and now you're about to receive a life-changing amount of tokens, all in one click."

The fund also pointed out that even the DAT (crypto treasury company) strategy is far less than the scale of future HYPE token unlocking. For example, Nasdaq-listed biotech company Sonnet BioTherapeutics will use its $305 million in cash to acquire more HYPE tokens.

In response to market concerns, DBA co-founder Jon Charbonneau and Flashbots Head of Strategy Hasu proposed a 45% reduction in the total supply of HYPE. The proposal notes that Hyperliquid currently holds a significant number of authorized, uncirculated tokens held by the Assistance Fund (AF, approximately 31 million HYPE) and Future Emissions and Community Rewards (FECR, approximately 4.21 million HYPE). The proposed changes to Hyperliquid's economic model include revoking authorizations for all unminted HYPE currently allocated to Future Emissions and Community Rewards (FECR), destroying all currently held and subsequently acquired HYPE in the Assistance Fund (AF), and removing the maximum supply cap of HYPE at 1 billion. This would optimize the protocol's financial structure without impacting the rights of existing token holders or the protocol's ability to fund its operations.

It is reported that the fund managed by DBA and the two proposers hold significant positions in HYPE. If the proposal is put to a formal governance vote, all relevant parties plan to vote in favor. Currently, the proposal has sparked widespread discussion and attention in the community.

The market has entered a period of accelerated differentiation, with incentives driving a short-term traffic boom

In recent days, Aster has been leveraging its wealth-generating power to attract users and attention to a growing number of emerging platforms. With the Perp DEX battle reignited, users are flocking to the platform to take advantage of airdrops, while platforms are employing various tactics to compete for liquidity.

Currently, Perp DEX presents a highly concentrated but rapidly differentiated market structure, in which the growth rate of leading companies has shown signs of slowing down, and emerging platforms are rising rapidly due to incentive expectations.

According to Dune data, as of September 23rd, Hyperliquid held the top spot among the top 10 perpetual swap markets with a 38.1% market share, followed closely by Lighter (16.8%), Aster (14.9%), and edgeX (12.3%). However, further analysis reveals that Hyperliquid's market share has declined from 49.3% 90 days ago to 38%, indicating a slight short-term decline. In contrast, emerging platforms have shown significant growth. For example, Paradex's trading volume surged 235.8% month-over-month over the past seven days; Aster saw a 146% increase over the past seven days; Lighter saw an approximately 166.7% increase over the past 90 days; and edgeX saw a whopping 544.2% increase in trading volume over the past 90 days. This suggests that recent market growth has been largely captured by emerging platforms.

In terms of daily trading volume, PerpetualPulse data shows that over the past 24 hours, the total trading volume of major Perp DEXs reached approximately $42.9 billion, of which Hyperliquid contributed $15.2 billion, Aster $8.6 billion, Lighter $6.3 billion, and edgeX $5.9 billion, respectively. These four platforms account for a combined 84.1% of the market, further confirming that market concentration remains high, but market share differentiation is accelerating.

Trading volume alone cannot fully reflect the true market situation. The ratio of open interest to trading volume (OI/Volume) is considered a better measure of user activity and market health. According to statistics from Dragonfly Managing Partner Haseeb Qureshi (September 22nd), a high ratio (>100%) indicates a platform with a large number of real users holding positions, active leverage usage, and relatively healthy markets. Examples include Hyperliquid's ratio of 287% and Jupiter's 395%. A medium-to-low ratio (10-65%) indicates that trading is primarily short-term or arbitrage, with limited real user activity. Examples include Lighter and Orderly's ratios of 29%. An extremely low ratio (<20%) suggests wash trading or incentive-driven trading, with a lack of long-term retention, such as Aster's 12% and Paradex's 13%.

In fact, the recent surges in trading volume and holdings on these platforms are highly correlated with their incentive mechanisms and market expectations. For example, Aster's short-term trading volume surged, driven by a wealth creation effect and the second phase of the airdrop. Lighter and edgeX, on the other hand, saw users aggressively accumulating points due to expectations of a Q4 token launch.

However, the overall market size of Perp DEX is entering a new stage. DeFillama data shows that as of September 23, Perp DEX's daily trading volume has exceeded US$43.21 billion, an increase of approximately 530.7% since the beginning of the year.

Overall, the core of the current Perp DEX competition is a battle for attention and incentives. In the short term, airdrops and token issuance expectations will likely continue to dominate traffic competition, driving periodic bursts of trading volume and user migration. However, the real key lies in whether the platform can transform this short-term influx of traffic into real user retention and long-term trading activity.