Hyperliquid smashes $1bn oil volume with price near $100 as Iran war intensifies

Hyperliquid has become the market’s 24/7 war desk.

The decentralised crypto-native perpetuals exchange clocked $1.2 billion in oil-linked trading volume as price spiked above $100 a barrel on Thursday amid Iranian attacks on shipping vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, a $500 billion maritime chokepoint.

Its native HYPE token also climbed 8% over the past 24 hours to about $37, extending a rally that traders increasingly tie to the platform’s role as a round-the-clock venue for macro risk.

“When traditional futures are closed, digital rails can still facilitate real-time price discovery,” Samar Sen, head of international markets at institutional crypto platform Talos, said in an investor note shared with DL News.

“As tokenised assets and digital market infrastructure mature, these markets could increasingly act as a 24/7 extension of traditional finance.”

The surge in Hyperliquid’s commodities-linked volume and HYPE’s price reflects a structural shift in how onchain traders process geopolitical chaos.

The exchange is drawing major capital from traders taking positions in real-world commodities like oil and precious metals as Bitcoin has been sidelined between $60,000 and $70,000 for much of the past month.

The exchange’s growth also signals a broader convergence between decentralised finance and traditional macro trading. Commodities, once confined to key hubs like Chicago or London, are now traded through smart contracts by a global anonymous user base.

Oil-linked contracts have surged to become one of the most actively traded markets on the platform, at times surpassing even Ether in daily volume.

“This is an important step towards housing all of finance,” Hyperliquid said.

Hyperliquid’s architecture — a decentralised order book with stablecoin-settled perpetuals — lets users express crude, metals and equity views at any hour without the hoops that are a part of more traditional platforms.

Meanwhile, traditional crypto-native exchanges aren’t seeing the same volumes when it comes to real-world assets.

While Coinbase saw volumes surge by 35% to $100 million over the past 24 hours, that’s just a tenth of Hyperliquid.

War escalation

Several international banks have already moved to limit staff exposure in the Gulf. HSBC has told employees in Qatar to remain at home, while Citi and Standard Chartered have taken similar steps for staff in Dubai.

On Wednesday, Iran warned that oil could more than double in price to $200 a barrel if the US and Israel continued to wage war on the country, which analysts warn could prove a further drag on the price of Bitcoin, which has lost about half of its value since October.

Oil prices climbed sharply on Thursday, briefly touching $100 a barrel, after three more commercial vessels came under attack in the Gulf, heightening fears that the widening Middle East conflict could disrupt global energy supplies.

The surge came despite an agreement by 32 countries on Wednesday to release 400 million barrels from strategic petroleum reserves in an effort to stabilise markets and reassure traders about supply.

Shipping incidents continue to mount. Two oil tankers were struck near Iraq, while a container vessel was hit by a similar projectile close to the United Arab Emirates.

Speaking on Wednesday, US President Donald Trump sought to calm markets, saying he expected oil prices to fall. “It’s going to come down more than we, than anybody understands,” he said.

Meanwhile, violence across the region is intensifying. In Lebanon, new Israeli air strikes reportedly killed several people, including at least eight in Beirut’s seafront district. Iranian attacks were also reported elsewhere in the Gulf, including in Bahrain and Oman.

Crypto market movers

• Bitcoin is up 0.4% over the past 24 hours, trading at $69,876.
• Ethereum is up 1.3% past 24 hours at $2,047.

What we’re reading

• Iran warns oil could hit $200 per barrel. Here’s what that could mean for Bitcoin’s price — DL News
• Bankers rage against stablecoins with Clarity Act hamstrung ahead of US midterms — DL News
• Polymarket Turns to Palantir AI as Prediction Markets Expand — Unchained
• Binance files defamation lawsuit against Wall Street Journal, demands jury trial — DL News
• The ‘Bitcoin Vacuum’ explained — Milk Road

Lance Datskoluo is DL News’ Europe-based markets correspondent. Got a tip? Email him at lance@dlnews.com.