Can HYPE 3x from its current levels after Hyperliquid flipped ETH on daily fees?

For months, a decentralized derivatives exchange called Hyperliquid has been quietly raking in more daily cash than crypto titans like Ethereum and Solana. On 7 July, it pulled in an eye-watering $1.7 million in fees, even beating out Bitcoin for the day.

This wasn’t just a weird blip on the charts; it was a genuine “flippening” that begs the question – Can Hyperliquid’s HYPE token really triple from where it sits today?

Nothing ‘lucky’ about it

Hyperliquid’s surge hasn’t been luck though. They built everything from the ground up, on their own private Layer 1 blockchain. This isn’t some app running on Ethereum; it’s a purpose-built highway for trading, giving it the raw speed of a centralized exchange. Every single order, trade, and cancellation happens out in the open on its own chain, thanks to a fully on-chain central limit order book.

This transparency kills the censorship risk that plagues off-chain models. Behind the scenes, a custom consensus mechanism called HyperBFT pushes through 200,000 orders a second with nearly instant finality, attracting pro traders who can’t afford lag.

A clever points system, running from late 2023 into 2024, poured gasoline on this fire by rewarding platform activity. That program led to one of crypto’s biggest airdrops in November 2024, when 310 million HYPE tokens (31% of the supply) landed in the wallets of 94,000 early birds. The lingering hope of a “Season 2” airdrop keeps people trading, especially since a huge 38.9% of the supply is still reserved for the community.

People might have come for the free tokens, but many stuck around because the platform is easy to use. With a familiar order book and no gas fees on trades, it directly challenges the feel of the big centralized exchanges.

Jumping 3x from its press time market cap of $15 billion will be a tall order. To get there, Hyperliquid needs several big things to go right.

First of all, it has to keep its stranglehold on the on-chain perpetuals market, where it sometimes handles over 70% of all volume. In May 2025 alone, it saw $248 billion in trades, generating $66 million in fees—more than Tron, Solana, and Ethereum. To triple in value, it must not only defend this turf, but steal more business from the massive centralized exchanges.

The fact that it handled a billion-dollar position during a recent “stress test” with trader James Wynn shows it has the muscle for institutional money. The platform’s Assistance Fund then uses a chunk of that fee revenue to buy HYPE off the market, creating a direct link between the exchange’s success and the token’s price.

Price, updates, and other ‘game-changers’

The real game-changer could be HyperEVM, the platform’s smart contract layer that’s compatible with Ethereum. Launched in February 2025, it’s turning Hyperliquid from just an exchange into a launchpad for a whole DeFi economy. We’re already seeing the first signs of life with lending apps like Hyperlend and even memecoin projects popping up.

As more builders arrive, they’ll need HYPE for gas and staking, adding a “Layer 1” premium to its price. The Total Value Locked (TVL) on HyperEVM has already shot past $1.4 billion, showing that demand is real.

Some analysts argue HYPE might be cheap even now, with fair value models putting it between $38 and $59, right where it’s trading. Compared to its rivals, its Price-to-Sales ratio has been much healthier lately because its revenue has been strong. On top of that, the available supply of HYPE has been shrinking.

Source: TradingView

In fact, data from July 2025 revealed that 9 million fewer tokens are liquid than in June, naturally putting upward pressure on the price.

Even so, the path ahead is full of landmines.

The derivatives space is a knife-fight, with established players like dYdX and a swarm of new exchanges on Ethereum Layer 2s, which just got much cheaper to use after the Dencun upgrade. The biggest shadow, however, is regulation.

Regulations and security concerns

Hyperliquid has talked with regulators like the U.S CFTC, but its no-KYC policy and reported dealings with sanctioned groups like Lazarus are huge red flags. A crackdown from regulators could gut its user base overnight.

Security is another constant worry. The “JELLY incident” in March 2025 revealed cracks in the platform’s risk and liquidation systems, causing major paper losses for its liquidity providers. Hyperliquid fixed the issue and paid users back, but the event exposed how it could be manipulated. The fix itself—a centralized decision by validators to ignore price data and delist the token—also made many question just how decentralized the project really is.

Finally, you have to wonder if the growth can last. A huge chunk of its early momentum came from dangling points and airdrops. The platform has done a decent job of keeping users, but the real test is whether it can attract traders who are there for the long haul, not just chasing the next handout.

Hyperliquid has definitely shaken up the derivatives world. It proved a purpose-built chain can run circles around the biggest names in crypto, at least in terms of making money. It has the tech, the incentives, and a smart way of funneling value back to its token.

A 3x jump from here is bold, but not impossible, if it can keep stealing market share from the big boys, build out its HyperEVM ecosystem, and dodge the massive regulatory and security bullets heading its way. The risks are very real, but so is the potential of a project that’s not just talking about the future of finance, but actually shipping it.