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Apollo Crypto made Hyperliquid its largest altcoin position, and head of research Pratik Kala stated that the protocol stands out not only because of its product-market fit, but also because its token design and market-extensive structure give traders something that few other crypto venues currently offer: a usable, income-based infrastructure.
Kala described Hyperliquid in unflattering terms in comments shared via X. “Hyperliquid is our largest altcoin position in the fund. Why? Because it’s amazing. The product works,” he said. For Apollo, the case rests on two pillars: the exchange’s approach as a trading venue, and the Kala token model is cleaner and more transparent than many recent industry practices.
He compared Hyperliquid’s buyback structure to the more complex systems that defined previous market cycles. “Tokenomics is refreshing. It uses 97 to 99%, depending on how you want to calculate it, of all revenue to buy back the token in a transparent way. There’s no governance. No, you know, the token goes into some other token and some dynamic inflation, a lot of burning and seizing, people have been eliminated.” how many years”.
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This framework is central to Apollo’s thesis. Cala’s argument is not only that Hyperliquid has momentum, but that it has paired a working product with a token settlement model that traders can actually follow. In an area where valuation stories are often tied to future management or unclear profits, he presented Hyperliquid relatively simply: business activity generates income, and this income provides the purchase of tokens.
He also pointed to adoption trends. According to Kala, “a lot of volume is going there,” with market makers and funds increasingly using the platform. He argued that Hyperliquid excelled “in many ways”, particularly in how it handles new listings, pre-markets and other product expansions.
However, a key part of the bullish case is HIP-3, which Kala said is already opening up trading opportunities outside of the regular crypto table. He described a weekend trade that was triggered by the news that OpenAI had signed a contract after Anthropic refused to use its AI technology by the Department of Defense. As development collapsed when traditional markets were closed, Kala said most market participants were effectively left out.
“Personally, I did 50%. How? Because HIP3, OpenAI, Anthropic were both trading on HIP3,” he said. “The payout isn’t fantastic, but OpenAI was up 50% over the weekend. Anthropic was static, and you could have expected a spread trade where you could open Anthropic AI and go long. Do it in HIP3, you can make money, you can generate alpha.”
This example gets to Apollo’s broader point. HIP-3 is positioned not only as another product vertical, but also as a place where traders can express their view of events in assets that are not normally available during news broadcasts. Kala said the market now includes private market trading as well as stocks and listed commodities such as oil, gold and silver on weekends.
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He offered one data point to show early: during the silver mania, HIP-3 briefly accounted for 1% to 2% of the world’s silver volume, even though it had only started a month to six weeks earlier. For Cala, this is not a retail innovation, but represents a serious attraction for hedge funds, sophisticated investors and active portfolio managers looking for overnight performance.
He added that HIP-3’s revenue will be split 50-50 between Placed Markets and Hyperliquid, with Hyperliquid’s share going back into HYPE purchases. From Apollo’s point of view, this strengthens the flywheel, rather than solving it.
Kala also hinted at what might happen next. HIP-4, which focuses on markets and predictive capabilities, could push the platform even further, while regulatory changes in the US could eventually pave the way for a KYC-compliant version there, he said. There is competition, he acknowledged, including from rival platforms like Lighter. But according to Apollo, Hyperliquid has already done a more difficult job than opening a new location: it has attracted traders’ attention, liquidity and, increasingly, loyalty.
At press time, HYPE was traded at $30,485.
Featured image created with DALL.E, chart from TradingView.com
