Hyperliquid Revolutionizes DeFi with Composability and Shared Liquidity

The concept that liquidity breeds liquidity is particularly relevant for Hyperliquid, a decentralized exchange that has gained popularity among traders, especially those interested in perpetual futures or 'perps'. Founded by Harvard classmates Jeff Yan and a pseudonymous developer known as iliensinc, Hyperliquid has been live since early 2023 and is now capitalizing on the depth and volume of its order book by introducing a concept akin to composability. This DeFi concept allows permissionless smart contracts to interlock seamlessly, much like LEGO blocks, to create new tokenized financial products. Hyperliquid's Ethereum-compatible HyperEVM is directly connected to its high-performance, homegrown HyperCore blockchain. This allows other applications to build upon the platform's shared liquidity without fragmenting it. Essentially, applications such as wallets or other exchanges can utilize Hyperliquid as a backend, providing perps trading and other services to their users. As more developers integrate with Hyperliquid, the platform's liquidity deepens, the variety of assets expands, and network effects intensify. Currently, hundreds of developers, including prominent names like MetaMask, Phantom wallet, and the South African exchange VALR, are utilizing Hyperliquid's 'builder codes' system, generating approximately $90 million in revenue. The platform has garnered significant praise from its growing user base. 'Hyperliquid is more than just a perpetuals exchange; it's akin to AWS for finance,' said Hyunsu Jung, CEO of Hyperion DeFi, the first U.S.-listed treasury company focused on Hyperliquid's native token, HYPE. 'While the perps aspect is notable, Hyperliquid is essentially a layer-one blockchain infrastructure providing liquidity and execution services. Builders can focus on creating their own user interfaces while Hyperliquid handles the underlying liquidity and trade execution,' Jung explained. Similar to AWS, builders maintain full control over their users and interfaces, while Hyperliquid provides the necessary liquidity and execution. Integrators of builder codes can charge fees based on the notional size of their users' trades without needing to develop or maintain the backend infrastructure or liquidity. 'Builder codes allow integrators to focus on delivering exceptional user experiences while Hyperliquid serves as the backbone for liquidity and execution,' said Sterling Barnett, business development lead at Hyperliquid Labs. 'Integrators can offer their users top-notch on-chain liquidity and institutional-grade infrastructure while earning fees on every trade.' For an application like MetaMask, which boasts over 100 million users worldwide, integrating with Hyperliquid's EVM module makes perfect sense. Since October 2025, MetaMask has provided its users with self-custodial access to perps directly from the wallet. As a wallet, MetaMask has the advantage of streamlined fund transfers, allowing users to trade directly with the tokens they already hold. The platform's money account, social login, and follow trading features are all integrated with Hyperliquid, which handles matching, oracle, and margin engine tasks. 'Matching orders is a challenging task, and Hyperliquid excels at it, so we don't attempt to rebuild it,' said Matthieu Saint Olive, Staff Product Manager at MetaMask. 'By routing orders directly to the Hyperliquid order book, MetaMask Perps offers some of the best liquidity and execution quality available.' MetaMask is witnessing growth beyond the crypto space, with commodities and equities becoming increasingly popular. 'Real-world-asset markets have grown from a small fraction of perp volume at the start of 2026 to roughly a quarter of it today,' Saint Olive noted. In terms of fees, MetaMask charges a flat 0.1% builder fee, with no hidden spread or execution costs, allowing traders to verify exactly what they paid. 'We believe transparency is a significant advantage and are exploring innovative pricing models to make our economics a reason people choose MetaMask, not a source of friction,' Saint Olive added. It's interesting to note that a large centralized exchange like VALR has opted to utilize Hyperliquid's perps order book for its liquidity requirements. Despite initially building its own infrastructure, including risk and liquidation engines, VALR struggled to achieve sufficient volume and liquidity for its perpetual futures. 'Our volume is genuine; we don't engage in wash trading or any similar practices. We recognized Hyperliquid's ability to bring together a vast amount of volume and market participants from around the world and decided to integrate with their platform,' said Farzam Ehsani, CEO and co-founder of VALR. Looking ahead, as major players like Robinhood, Coinbase, and Intercontinental Exchange expand their perps offerings, opportunities for cross-venue arbitrage will emerge, according to Jung. 'Imagine maintaining one position on Robinhood and the other side of the position on Hyperliquid. With a significant amount of non-toxic flow from retail users entering and exiting the market, you'll be able to see more organic mechanisms for funding rates,' Jung explained.