Hyperliquid H1 Total Fees Up 31% to $419M, HYPE Valuation Approaches Traditional Trading Platforms

On August 21, Hyperliquid released its H1 2026 performance analysis. Data shows its total fee income for the first half reached $419.3 million, up 31% year-over-year; daily active users grew approximately 90%, with H1 trading volume hitting $1.29 trillion and June monthly volume reaching $266.5 billion.

However, Hyperliquid's core protocol revenue fell from $317.5 million in H1 2025 to $305.3 million, down 3.8% year-over-year. The primary reason is the rapid expansion of the HIP-3 market, a mechanism allowing external teams to launch markets for equities, commodities, and pre-IPO assets on Hyperliquid's infrastructure while receiving 50% of trading fees. HIP-3 now contributes 11.2% of total fee income.

In the derivatives market, Hyperliquid's open interest stands at approximately $9.1 billion, representing 10.3% of the global crypto perpetual contract market, up 24.8% year-over-year; in the on-chain perpetual contract market, its share reaches 54.5%, exceeding the combined total of all other on-chain platforms. On valuation, when factoring in approximately $309 million in annualized HYPE token issuance costs, HYPE's issuance-adjusted price-to-earnings ratio is roughly 23x, closely aligning with the average of approximately 24.5x for traditional exchange peers such as CME, CBOE, Interactive Brokers, and Coinbase. The report projects that if the USDC reserve yield partnership materializes, it could generate approximately $135 million to $160 million in additional annual revenue for Hyperliquid, which would be used for HYPE buybacks. The report notes that Hyperliquid's H2 growth still faces competition and regulatory risks, including high reliance on a single developer for HIP-3 markets and regulatory uncertainty surrounding equities and pre-IPO asset markets; however, new businesses such as HIP-4 prediction markets, options products, and USDC reserve yields could further broaden its revenue streams.

[BlockBeats]