HYPE Surges 101% This Year: What’s Driving Hyperliquid’s Growth?

In brief HYPE is up 91% year-to-date while Bitcoin is down 12%, a decoupling tied to Hyperliquid's revenue diversification beyond crypto perps. Hyperliquid pulled $255M in revenue YTD, more than the next two apps combined, with 97% accruing to HYPE holders via buybacks. Bitwise and 21Shares have filed for HYPE ETFs, with Bitwise committing to hold 10% of management fees in Hyperliquid on its balance sheet. Hyperliquid's native token HYPE has surged 101% year-to-date while Bitcoin is down 12% over the same period, highlighting a decoupling that Wall Street is starting to pay close attention to. HYPE’s run looks set to continue, with users of prediction market Myriad , owned by Decrypt's parent company Dastan, seeing an 85% chance the token reaches $52 in May, up from just 14% on May 15. The token is currently trading at $51.26, less than 2% shy of the target figure, per CoinGecko data . HYPE’s divergence from BTC reflects Hyperliquid’s transformation from a crypto perpetual exchange into a multi-asset platform targeting real-world assets, pre-IPO markets, and global financial infrastructure, according to market observers. Matt Hougan, CIO of Bitwise, argued that the platform is undervalued in a tweet Monday, noting that it’s targeting the “$600 trillion global asset market.” He added that, “Hyperliquid is not a crypto app. It's a super app.” Hyperliquid is not a crypto app. It's a super app. It's not targeting the $3 trillion crypto economy. It's targeting the $600 trillion global asset market. Investors are valuing it as one thing. It's the other. https://t.co/DTdYf7FpGb — Matt Hougan (@Matt_Hougan) May 19, 2026 The market is treating Bitcoin and HYPE as two completely different trades, according to Matthew Pinnock, COO at Altura DeFi. “Bitcoin is increasingly behaving like a macro reserve asset, so price action is heavily tied to Fed rates, ETF flows, and broader liquidity conditions,” he told Decrypt . On the other hand, HYPE is being priced more like “high-growth financial infrastructure,” with the exchange “absorbing volume across perpetuals, commodities, equities, and broader tokenized macro markets at a pace the market did not expect this early.”  Key Hyperliquid drivers The exponential growth can be seen in the fees generated by Hyperliquid. It has quietly become crypto's dominant fee generator, pulling in $255 million in year-to-date revenue, which is more than the next two platforms combined, Cam Khosravi, research analyst at Bitwise, posted Monday. Wild: Hyperliquid has pulled in $255M of revenue YTD more than the next two apps combined, and roughly a third of all revenue across the top 10. Nearly all of it is perp trading fees, and roughly 97% accrue back to hyperliquid:native holders through automated open-market… pic.twitter.com/vvIiAuowCS — Cam Khosravi (@CamKhosravi) May 18, 2026 It accounts for roughly one-third of all revenue across the top 10 protocols. Nearly all of that revenue comes from perpetual trading fees, and roughly 97% of it accrues back to HYPE holders through automated open-market buybacks. The platform now captures 43% of all chain fees, or approximately $11 million weekly. Hyperliquid dominates the current fee market with a 43% share ($11M/week) fueled by high-margin perpetuals, significantly outperforming Ethereum's 13% ($3M) and Solana's 10% ($2M) despite the latter's high transaction volume pic.twitter.com/Uzi0e1s17x — unfolded. (@cryptounfolded) May 20, 2026 The decoupling comes down to product dominance, Andri Fauzan Adziima, research lead at Bitrue Research Institute, told Decrypt , attributing HYPE’s performance to the tokenization perps, including the S&P 500, oil, and commodities, which have grown considerably over the past few weeks amid geopolitical turbulence. “This TradFi rotation and permissionless market creation give HYPE its own independent demand engine.” Consequently, the real-world asset trading on Hyperliquid reached a new all-time high of $2.6 billion in open interest, double the amount from two months ago, according to the platform's Monday post . Hyperliquid’s HIP-3 and IPOs The growth follows the success of HIP-3, which has processed more than $120 billion in volume for pre-IPO companies , including SpaceX, Anthropic, and OpenAI. HIP-4, focused on structured products and prediction markets, is expected to expand the platform's addressable market further. In other news, 21Shares and Bitwise filed for Hyperliquid ETFs last week, with Bitwise taking it a step further, committing to allocate 10% of the fund's management fee to holding HYPE on its balance sheet. Adziima expects the momentum to continue, pushing the token to $55-65, fueled by “RWA momentum and ETF inflows.” His long-term outlook envisions Hyperliquid as a “decentralized super app” for global assets, with “multi-billion-dollar annual revenue potential.” Daily Debrief Newsletter Start every day with the top news stories right now, plus original features, a podcast, videos and more. Your Email Get it! Get it!