The cryptocurrency exchange Hyperliquid has set a record for tokenized assets

The decentralized exchange Hyperliquid recorded an unprecedented result: for the first time in its history, tokenized traditional assets—stocks, oil, and stock indices—exceeded the trading volume of cryptocurrencies. During the week of July 13−19, so-called real-world assets (RWA) accounted for 54% of the platform’s total weekly trading volume, which reached $ 48.2 billion, according to Blockworks.

Lorenzo Valente, Director of Digital Asset Research at ARK Invest, reported this milestone. In a post on X, he called the event the beginning of a new era for decentralized finance. According to his calculations, RWA trading volume on Hyperliquid for the week totaled $ 26 billion—more than the combined volume of cryptocurrency perpetual contracts on all other decentralized exchanges worldwide.

The figures look even more impressive in a broader context. The total weekly volume of perpetual contracts across all DEXs was $ 79 billion. Of that, $ 50 billion came from Hyperliquid. In other words, the RWA segment of a single platform alone exceeded the entire crypto DEX market excluding it.

The technical foundation for this was the HIP-3 system, which Hyperliquid launched in October 2025. It allows third-party teams to create their own perpetual markets on the exchange’s infrastructure. To gain access, users must stake 500,000 HYPE tokens—currently worth about $ 30 million. Pre-IPO contracts for SpaceX, Anthropic, and OpenAI have already been traded via HIP-3.

Since June, the structure of RWA trading has changed significantly: individual stocks have overtaken indices and commodities. Perpetual contracts on individual stocks now account for 61% of total RWA trading volume. The most actively traded asset is South Korean memory manufacturer SK Hynix—a direct competitor to Samsung in the supply of DRAM and high-bandwidth memory for artificial intelligence systems.

ARK Invest has been keeping an eye on Hyperliquid for some time. Back in September 2025, CEO Cathie Wood compared the platform to the early days of Solana and called it «a newcomer to watch.» The company has not officially confirmed any information about the fund’s open positions in HYPE.

Valente, however, raised a broader question for the entire industry. He wrote that he is no longer certain whether RWA trading will naturally concentrate on the same platforms as cryptocurrencies, and that control over Bitcoin and Ethereum flows may turn out to be «far less important than many believe.» Traders who focus exclusively on crypto tokens, in his view, «are looking at the wrong market.»