How Hyperliquid hit $330B in monthly trading volume with just 11 employees
In July 2025, Hyperliquid achieved approximately $330 billion in monthly trading volume, surpassing Robinhood. This decentralized perpetuals exchange operates on a custom layer 1 chain with a split design: HyperCore manages the onchain order book and margining, while HyperEVM provides a general-purpose smart contract layer. This architecture secures transactions with HyperBFT, offering low-latency execution with median trade latencies of 0.2 seconds. Hyperliquid's success stems from a small, lean team of 11, allowing rapid decision-making and strategic independence from venture capital. The platform encourages user engagement through a large airdrop and integrates with Phantom Wallet, which significantly boosted user numbers. The operational structure combines trader activity with liquidity provision through the Hyperliquidity Provider vault and an Assistance Fund that enables fee buybacks, ensuring a self-reinforcing liquidity loop. Despite its rapid growth, concerns regarding centralization and operational risks persist, including responses to outages and validator transparency. Future prospects depend on maintaining decentralization and competitive volume levels as the market evolves.
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