Decentralized derivatives exchange Hyperliquid has consistently outperformed traditional finance giants in terms of volume and net income.

DefiLlama data estimates Hyperliquid’s annualized net income at $1.24 billion as of Sept. 12, exceeding Nasdaq’s $1.12 billion net income for the entirety of 2024 by 11%.

The comparison positions the DeFi platform ahead of one of the world’s largest stock exchanges in net income, despite operating with just 11 team members.

Additionally, data from ASXN shows Nasdaq employed 9,162 people in 2024, producing a net income per employee ratio of $123,335.52.

Hyperliquid’s 11-person team generates approximately $113 million per employee, establishing the highest net income-to-employee ratio in global financial markets.

Volumes surpass Robinhood

The trading protocol posted $420.3 billion in total trading volume during August, extending its winning streak against Robinhood to four consecutive months.

Robinhood published August trading figures on Sept. 11, revealing $227.5 billion in total volume across all products.

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The breakdown included $199.2 billion from equity trading, $195.5 million from options contracts, $13.7 billion from crypto trading in the Robinhood App, and $14.4 billion from crypto trading on the Bitstamp exchange.

Hyperliquid processed $398 billion in perpetual contracts and $22.3 billion in spot trading during the same period, creating a $170.5 billion volume advantage over the retail trading platform. The August performance marks the platform’s strongest monthly showing since beginning its winning streak against Robinhood.

The volume comparison traces back to May, when Hyperliquid first overtook Robinhood with $256 billion versus $192 billion, according to data shared by Jon Ma from Artemis.

June volumes reached $231 billion for Hyperliquid compared to Robinhood’s $193 billion, followed by July’s $330.8 billion versus $237.8 billion performance. Its July advantage represented its largest monthly gap at 39.1% before August’s results widened the margin further to nearly 85%.

Amid these results, Hyperliquid’s HYPE token registered a new all-time high of $57.30 on Sept. 12, up roughly 760% from its launch price of $6.51 on Nov. 28, 2024.

The platform continues to demonstrate how decentralized exchanges can compete directly with established retail trading platforms while maintaining lean operational structures that generate outsized returns per employee.

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As the price of gold is on the cusp of breaking its April peak, the market size of crypto tokens backed by the precious metal has already surged to fresh all-time highs.

The overall market capitalization of tokenized gold topped $2.57 billion, CoinGecko data shows, as the two leading offerings, Tether’s XAUT and Paxos’ PAXG tokens, saw sizable inflows recently. Both tokens’s are designed to track the price of gold and are backed by physical bars held in vaults.

XAUT (XAUT), issued by the firm that’s behind the USDT stablecoin, saw a $437 million jump in its supply to a record $1.3 billion, per CoinGecko. Tether’s Treasury minted 129,000 tokens in early August on the Ethereum network, blockchain data by Etherscan shows.

PAXG (PAXG), the gold-backed token of U.S.-based stablecoin firm Paxos, swelled to a record market size of $983 million, DefiLlama data shows. That’s been fueled by $141.5 million net inflows into the token since June.

Gold currently traded at around $3,470, just shy of the April 22 peak hit amidst the tariff tantrum.

The precious metal, which is widely considered as a safe haven asset during times of uncertainty, has been resurging lately, driven by a steepening U.S. Treasury yield curve.

Read more: Gold’s Rally Has a Big Catalyst, and It Could Help Bitcoin Too

Blockchain infrastructure platform Centrifuge has crossed $1 billion in total value locked (TVL), joining the ranks of BlackRock’s BUIDL fund and Ondo Finance as the only real-world asset (RWA) platforms to surpass the milestone.

Centrifuge CEO Bhaji Illuminati attributed the milestone to institutions moving from pilots to “real deployments,” alongside strong onchain allocator demand.

“Markets need more than T-bills,” Illuminati told Cointelegraph, pointing to JAAA, an onchain version of Janus Henderson’s AAA-rated collateralized loan obligation (CLO) investment fund, as a natural next step for institutions seeking higher yields than risk-free rates.

Illuminati said that US Treasurys remain the dominant entry point for onchain allocators, but the JAAA product is the fastest-growing tokenized fund in the segment. “We are also seeing rising interest in private credit as institutions look for differentiated yield, with more news coming soon on that front,” he added.

Related: GENIUS Act yield ban may push trillions into tokenized assets — ex-bank exec

Strong demand for tokenized S&P 500

In early July, Centrifuge unveiled a tokenized S&P 500 product as part of a partnership with S&P Dow Jones Indices (S&P DJI). The product is structured as a regulated professional fund in the British Virgin Islands.

According to Illuminati, demand has been “very strong” ahead of its official rollout in the coming weeks. The launch will be supported by an anchor pool of capital to ensure broad accessibility from day one.

Illuminati added that the S&P 500 is only the beginning, with plans to bring sector-specific and thematic indexes onchain in the near future. “We see strong potential for sector and thematic index products to come onchain next,” he said.

Centrifuge’s pipeline is split between traditional asset managers using  Web3 native asset manager Anemoy and onchain-native managers leveraging its RWA Launchpad. On the demand side, stablecoins and yield products are the biggest buyers, using RWAs to set a “yield floor” for reserves.

Related: eToro to tokenize 100 most popular US stocks on Ethereum

deRWA to bring tokenized assets to retail

Illuminati highlighted plans to open tokenized assets to retail investors through major exchanges, wallets, lending protocols and DeFi integrations through the deRWA initiative. deRWA, as used in DeFi, stands for tokenized RWAs that are engineered for composability and liquidity within DeFi.

As reported, S&P Dow Jones Indices (S&P DJI) is also in discussions with major exchanges, custodians and DeFi protocols to license and list tokenized versions of its benchmarks, according to Stephanie Rowton, the firm’s director of US equities.

“By establishing these types of relationships, we hope we can work together to participate in a robust infrastructure that supports the trading and accessibility of tokenized versions of our indexes, ultimately enhancing the investor experience,” Rowton said.

Looking ahead, Illuminati expects public market RWAs such as Treasurys and equities to lead adoption in the short term due to liquidity and familiarity. However, he believes private markets will eventually dominate, as blockchain removes inefficiencies and unlocks hidden value.

In a report earlier this month, Boston Consulting Group and Ripple estimated that tokenized real-world assets could exceed $18 trillion by 2033, with a compound annual growth rate of 53%.

Magazine: TradFi is building Ethereum L2s to tokenize trillions in RWAs — Inside story

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Decentralized exchanges (DEX) reached $1 trillion in monthly trading volume for the first time in July.

According to DefiLlama data, spot trading volume grew 29.4% and reached nearly $514 billion last month, bested only by January’s all-time high of $568 billion.

At the same time, perpetual futures’ monthly volume increased 33.6% to register a new all-time high of $487 billion, with Hyperliquid registering a new record in monthly perpetual trading.

BNB dominance on spot

For the third consecutive month, BNB Chain dominated spot trading volumes. The chain’s volumes grew 15.3% and totaled $196.3 billion in July, representing 38.2% the monthly total.

PancakeSwap was the main driver behind growth, which amounted to $188.2 billion in spot trading volume. The BNB-native exchange volume is larger than the other four top DEXs combined, which is approximately $168 billion.

Uniswap registered the second-largest spot volume among DEXs in July, with $96.4 billion. Meanwhile, Solana-based decentralized exchanges wrapped up the top five.

Raydium, Meteora, and Orca registered $31.8 billion, $20 billion, and $19.5 billion, respectively. The five largest blockchains by volume remained the same between June and July, with just one slight change.

Runner-ups

Ethereum registered the second-largest monthly volume at nearly $86 billion, growing 49.3% from June, while Solana slid from second to third place in monthly spot trading volume despite growing 36.6% to reach $85.1 billion. 

Base and Arbitrum maintained their posts from June as the fourth- and fifth-largest blockchains by spot trading volume, respectively. 

Base’s volume increased by 46.8% and reached $41.6 billion, the first time the layer-2 blockchain surpassed $40 billion since January. At the same time, Arbitrum was the only chain in the top five with one-digit growth, reaching $19.2 billion in volume after jumping 7.4%.

Hyperliquid’s perpetuals reign

Hyperliquid became the first blockchain to surpass the $300 billion threshold in perpetual volume, reaching $323.4 billion in July after a 48.3% growth.

The volume surpasses Ethereum’s $48.7 billion by a large margin, which held the spot of the second-largest chain in perpetual trading volume last month. Despite the difference, Ethereum has grown by almost 56% since June.

The difference is even larger when decentralized exchanges for perpetual’s volumes are considered. Hyperliquid reached $313.4 billion, dominating 64.3% of the market and posting 16 times Jupiter’s volume of $19.4 billion.

Solana, BNB Chain, and Arbitrum wrap up the top five in perpetuals with $37.2 billion, $21.6 billion, and $19 billion in volumes, respectively.

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Teucrium 2x Long Daily XRP ETF (XXRP) reached $323.6 million in net flows this week, being the first XRP exchange-traded fund (ETF) traded in the US to surpass the $300 million threshold.

According to VettaFi’s data, XXRP now represents 52.5% of the total $616 million in net flows registered by US-traded XRP ETFs. 

Notably, all exchange-traded products (ETPs) tied to XRP in the US are pegged to derivatives, with the SEC yet to greenlight spot products as of July 29.

Two-digit growth

According to CoinShares, XRP ETPs captured $189 million in inflows last week. XXRP’s $73.4 million in net flows then represented 39% of the global flows, and a 22.7% weekly growth in inflows.

On July 21, XXRP saw the most significant daily volume of any XRP ETF in the US to date, capturing $50.4 million. 

The Teucrium ETF is the oldest of the four XRP ETFs traded in the US, launched on April 8. On May 22, Volatility Shares launched its XRP products, the funds XRPI and XRPT. While XRPI offers no leverage, XRPT offers exposure to 2x leverage.

XRPI registered $124.6 million in inflows as of July 28, according to data from ETF.com. XRPT posted nearly $168 million in net flows in the same period.

Regarding last week’s performance, Volatility Shares’ funds registered similar growth. XRPI total inflows increased by 27% by $33.6 million. At the same time, XRPT added $43.6 million in inflows, growing 26%.

The youngest of the bunch is ProShares Ultra XRP ETF (UXRP), which became live on July 16. Since then, the 2x leverage ETF captured roughly $101,000 in inflows.

Outpaced by Solana products

Despite surpassing Solana (SOL) in total market cap to become the third-largest crypto, XRP ETPs still register a smaller inflow count than SOL-related products this year.

XRP-based products closed June with nearly $410 million in year-to-date flows, against SOL’s $292.5 million.

However, XRP products now amount to $721 million in the global total net flows, losing ground to Solana-tied ETPs and their $844 million in inflows.

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Market expert Mark Moss has drawn the crypto community’s attention to an indicator that has perfectly nailed Bitcoin cycle tops. Based on this indicator, the expert revealed that the cycle top is unlikely to happen this year, as other analysts may have predicted. 

Pi Cycle Top Indicator Reveals Next Bitcoin Cycle Top

In an X post, Moss stated that the indicator is predicting a Bitcoin cycle top in the first quarter of 2027, not at the end of this year. He made this comment while describing the Pi Cycle Top indicator as the “Holy Grail” of Bitcoin indicators. The expert noted that the indicator nailed the Bitcoin cycle tops in 2013, 2017, and 2021. 

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Moss admitted that this latest cycle top prediction is hard to believe, as everyone is expecting Bitcoin to peak in the fourth quarter of this year. However, the Pi Cycle Top indicator suggests that the Bitcoin cycle top will occur in Q1 2027 and that the BTC price could reach $395,000 by then. 

Crypto analyst Rekt Capital also recently alluded to the Pi Cycle Top indicator, noting how it was hinting at a possible cycle extension. He also confirmed that the indicator predicts a Bitcoin cycle top will occur in Q1 2027, with the flagship crypto possibly reaching $400,000. The analyst noted that, based on previous cycles, the Bitcoin cycle top is expected to happen in the fourth quarter of this year. 

However, the recent BTC rallies have caused the Moving Averages (MA) to shift to higher prices. With these MAs shifting with every Bitcoin rally, Rekt Capital stated that it could take at least until mid-early 2026 before a Pi Cycle Top crossover occurs. However, the analyst advised that it is still important to be cautious about Q4 of this year and possibly develop an exit strategy in case the Bitcoin cycle peaks then. 

The BTC 4-Year Cycle Is Over

In a recent podcast, Bloomberg analyst James Seyffart and Bitwise Chief Investment Officer (CIO) Matt Hougan gave their opinions on whether the 4-year Bitcoin cycle is over. Seyffart stated that he expects the amplitude of these cycles to reduce as more institutional investors enter the BTC ecosystem. 

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Based on his statement, a Bitcoin cycle top might not happen as many expect, as the analyst predicts there won’t be massive drawdowns again with the flagship crypto maturing. On the other hand, the Bitwise CIO opined that the 4-year cycle for BTC is over. 

He explained that the factors that drove this four-year cycle are now watered down. Meanwhile, there is a growing inflow into Bitcoin, which would continue to drive demand. In line with this, Hougan declared that 2026 will be an up year for Bitcoin. 

At the time of writing, the Bitcoin price is trading at around $119,000, down in the last 24 hours, according to data from CoinMarketCap.

Featured image from Pixabay, chart from Tradingview.com

If you sprint, you’re gonna get tired.

Same goes for the market – it’s been running hard, and now it’s catching its breath.

… But is it just a short water break, or are we looking at a my legs aren’t working anymore type of situation?

Well, CryptoQuant contributor Gaah pointed out that the IBCI dipped into the Distribution zone.

But! It only reached 80% on the scale.

Everyone who isn’t a nerd reading this:

Lemme explain:

The IBCI, aka Index Bitcoin Cycle Indicators, tells you whether the market is calm, heating up, or close to burning out.

It uses a 0 – 100% scale to track where we are in the Bitcoin cycle:

• 0% = market is quiet, early bull phase;

• 50% = things are heating up;

• 80 – 100% = high risk of a top, lots of hype;

• 100% = full euphoria, likely market peak.

So hitting 80% means we’re in a heated zone, but not at full euphoria yet. Past tops didn’t happen until we were right near 100%.

Two of the main indicators that feed into the IBCI help explain why it’s only at 80%:

1/ STH-SOPR

Full government name: short-term holder spent output profit ratio.

This indicator tracks how quickly short-term traders are taking profits – and it’s still low.

Translation: retail investors aren’t rushing to take profits yet.

2/ Puell Multiple

This one looks at how profitable Bitcoin miners are.

It’s still near its “cheap” zone – even though Bitcoin just hit a new all-time high.

If the market were truly overheated, miner revenue would be way above average by now. So this suggests there’s still room for upside.

So what does it all mean?

The market is heating up, but the usual signs of peak hype just aren’t here yet.

The IBCI is climbing, but it’s being held up by solid fundamentals – not speculation.

And while there’s definitely more risk now than a few months ago, especially for short-term pullbacks, the indicators suggest we’re not at the end of the cycle.

After rising rapidly over the weekend to hit new all-time highs, the Bitcoin price seems to have hit a brick wall above $120,000, sparking a correction. While this is expected to be a short correction, a notable development involving an 8-year trendline that has marked the top of previous cycles has emerged. If this trendline resistance holds and Bitcoin fails to break it, then it could mean that the top is in, and what usually follows is a drawn-out bear market.

8-Year Trendline Suggests Bitcoin Top Is In

Crypto analyst MartyBoots, in an analysis on TradingView, caught a test of a an 8-year trendline which began back in the 2017-2018 cycle, marking the top of multiple bull markets. This trendline continued into the next major bull market and in the 2020-2021 bull market, the trendline once again marked the cycle top, with Bitcoin peaking at $69,000.

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Presently, the Bitcoin price has once again come in contact with this trendline, and the rejection from here does suggest that this trendline could be the real deal. After hitting above $123,000, Bitcoin was promptly pushed back downward from this level as sell-offs and profit-taking became the order of the day.

For this trend to be complete, though, there are a number of things that would need to happen first. For example, the analyst explains that investors should watch for the weakly RSI divergence turning bullish. Additionally, a decline in volume and more rejection wicks for Bitcoin would be confirmation that the price has topped. Marty also explained that the price touching this trendline for a third time increases the odds of it actually playing out the same way it has in the past.

If this trendline does mark the top once again, then it could signal the start of another bear market. As the analyst explains, a top marked by this trendline has in the past “triggered multi-month correction and Bear Markets.”

Still A Chance For Bullish Continuation

The test of this trendline does not necessarily mean that the Bitcoin price has to top at this level, because there is still a chance of bullish continuation. As the analyst explains, a decisive break above the trendline would turn this level into support and trigger further upside.

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In addition to this, there is also a lot of buying pressure on the Bitcoin price despite the profit-taking. More importantly is the fact that very large orders await at the $114,000 level. This shows a lot of demand for BTC, something that could drive the price upward as the cost basis for investors remains on the rise.

Nevertheless, the analyst advises caution at this level until there is a confirmation either way. “Risk-management alert: consider tightening stops, reducing leverage, or hedging until trendline fate is resolved,” Marty said in closing.

Featured image from Dall.E, chart from TradingView.com