Hyperliquid Revolutionizes DeFi with Composable Liquidity

The concept that liquidity generates more liquidity is a fundamental principle in the financial world. Hyperliquid, a decentralized exchange, has become the go-to platform for traders seeking to engage with perpetual futures, also known as 'perps.' These blockchain-based derivatives contracts allow users to speculate on asset prices with leverage and no expiration date. Founded by Harvard classmates Jeff Yan and a pseudonymous developer known as iliensinc, Hyperliquid has been live since the start of 2023 and is capitalizing on the depth and volume of its order book by offering a unique concept: composability. This DeFi concept allows permissionless smart contracts to interlock like building blocks, creating new tokenized financial products. Hyperliquid's Ethereum-compatible HyperEVM connects directly to its high-performance HyperCore blockchain, enabling other applications to build upon the platform's shared liquidity rather than fragmenting it. As a result, applications like wallets or exchanges can utilize Hyperliquid as a backend to offer perps trading and other services, leading to a deeper liquidity pool, a broader range of assets, and compounding network effects. The platform has attracted hundreds of developers, including prominent names like MetaMask, Phantom wallet, and VALR, who have generated approximately $90 million in revenue through Hyperliquid's 'builder codes.' A growing number of enthusiasts are praising the platform, with Hyunsu Jung, CEO of Hyperion DeFi, describing Hyperliquid as 'the AWS for finance.' Jung highlights that the platform provides liquidity and execution, while builders own their users and control the user interface. The concept of builder codes allows integrators to focus on delivering a great user experience, while Hyperliquid handles the underlying liquidity and execution. Integrators can charge fees on the notional size of their users' trades without developing the backend or maintaining liquidity. Sterling Barnett, business development lead at Hyperliquid Labs, explains that 'builder codes let integrators focus on what they do best, delivering a great user experience, while Hyperliquid serves as the backend for liquidity and execution.' For apps like MetaMask, integrating with Hyperliquid's EVM module makes perfect sense, as it provides self-custodial access to perps directly from the wallet. MetaMask has given its users this access since October 2025, streamlining fund transfers and allowing users to trade directly with the tokens they already hold. Matthieu Saint Olive, Staff Product Manager at MetaMask, notes that 'matching orders is genuinely hard, and Hyperliquid is excellent at it, so we don't try to rebuild it.' By routing orders straight to the Hyperliquid order book, MetaMask Perps offers some of the best liquidity and execution quality available. MetaMask is seeing growth beyond crypto, with real-world-asset markets now accounting for roughly a quarter of perp volume. The company charges a flat 0.1% builder fee, with no hidden spread and nothing buried in execution, ensuring transparency. It's also exploring innovative pricing models to make the economics a reason people choose MetaMask. Even large centralized exchanges like VALR are handing over liquidity requirements to Hyperliquid's perps order book. Despite initially building all the infrastructure in-house, including risk and liquidation engines, the team at VALR found it challenging to achieve volume and liquidity. According to CEO and co-founder Farzam Ehsani, 'perpetual futures on our own books didn't take off as we had hoped they would, predominantly because of the liquidity and volume.' Ehsani notes that Hyperliquid brings a huge amount of volume and market participants from all over the world together, making it an attractive option. Looking ahead, when major players like Robinhood, Coinbase, and Intercontinental Exchange enter the perps market, there will be opportunities for cross-venue arbitrage, according to Jung. This will enable users to maintain positions on multiple platforms, creating more organic mechanisms for funding rates.