HIP-3 on Hyperliquid: How Builder-Deployed Perp Markets Work, Who Runs Them and How to Trade xyz Stocks, Indices & Commodities (2026)

HIP-3 is the Hyperliquid standard that lets any team stake HYPE and deploy its own perpetual futures market, on any asset with an oracle, directly onto the Hyperliquid on-chain order book. Since it launched on October 13, 2025, builder-deployed markets from trade.xyz, Ventuals, Felix and others have brought US stocks, the S&P 100, oil, gold, pre-IPO companies and more to the same engine that trades BTC and ETH. As of September 2026, HIP-3 markets account for well over a third of Hyperliquid's perp volume.

Key takeaways

• HIP-3 = permissionless perp deployment. A builder stakes 500,000 HYPE, wins a Dutch-auction deployment slot, sets the oracle, leverage and margin parameters, and can keep up to 50% of trading fees on its market.
• trade.xyz ("xyz") is the dominant deployer, listing xyz:NVDA, xyz:TSLA, XYZ100 (S&P 100 index), gold, silver, WTI crude, copper, uranium, DRAM/memory names and pre-IPO perps such as SpaceX (SPCX), Anthropic and OpenAI.
• Ventuals (vntl) focuses on pre-IPO and private-company perps; Felix, Kinetiq, Hyperliquid Strategies, Project X, Based, Liminal and Unit have all deployed or built on HIP-3 markets.
• HIP-3 markets trade like any other Hyperliquid perp but with a deployer prefix (xyz:, vntl:) and a builder fee on top of the base 0.045% / 0.015% rate.
• Extra risks: oracle quality, deployer discretion, thinner books and off-hours pricing when the underlying stock market is closed.
• HIP-3 Star (August 2026) gave deployers more control; HIP-5 and HIP-6 are later proposals extending the standard.

What is HIP-3 on Hyperliquid? (HIP-1 and HIP-2 recap first)

Hyperliquid Improvement Proposals (HIPs) are the protocol-level standards that define how new assets and markets come to exist on HyperCore. Before HIP-3, there were two.

HIP-1 is the native token standard: how a fungible token is created on HyperCore and gets a spot order book. Listing means winning a 31-hour Dutch auction for the ticker, with proceeds going toward HYPE burn. This is how PURR, HFUN and hundreds of later spot tokens came to be; "hyperliquid hip 1" is a token standard plus a market-based listing mechanism instead of a listing committee.

HIP-2 is Hyperliquidity, an on-chain automated liquidity strategy a HIP-1 deployer can attach so a fresh spot market has a usable book from day one. It is a permissionless market maker baked into the protocol rather than a Uniswap-style AMM, and it is why new spot tokens on Hyperliquid ("hyperliquid hip 2") have tight two-sided quotes almost immediately.

HIP-3 applies the same permissionless philosophy to perpetual futures. Until October 2025 every perp was listed by the core team, which ran the oracle and chose margin parameters. HIP-3 hands that job to builders: anyone who meets the stake requirement can deploy a perp on anything with a reliable price feed, from a Nasdaq stock or commodity future to an index or a pre-IPO valuation. The engine, margining, liquidations and clearing remain the protocol's; the deployer supplies the market definition and the oracle.

That is why people describe HIP-3 as "builder-deployed perpetuals" or "builder markets." It is not a separate exchange. It is the same Hyperliquid app DEX with more asset classes plugged in by third parties.

How HIP-3 mechanics work

The official spec lives in the Hyperliquid docs under HIP-3, and it is worth reading directly if you are a builder (see hyperliquid.gitbook.io/hyperliquid-docs). Here is the plain-English version.

The 500,000 HYPE stake

To deploy a HIP-3 market, the deployer must stake 500,000 HYPE. This is a security bond, not a fee: it stays locked while the market is live and can be slashed by validator vote if the deployer misbehaves, for example by feeding a manipulated oracle. At September 2026 prices that is tens of millions of dollars, a deliberately high bar that keeps the deployer list short and well-capitalized.

Dutch auction for deployment slots

Deployment capacity is rationed through a Dutch auction for the right to deploy in each window, the same mechanism HIP-1 uses for spot tickers: the price starts high and decays until a deployer accepts, and the team willing to pay the most wins. Proceeds are paid in HYPE and burned, so deployment itself is deflationary for the token.

The deployer sets the oracle

This is the most important design choice to understand. In a native Hyperliquid perp, validators run the oracle. In a HIP-3 market, the deployer publishes the oracle price. trade.xyz, for example, aggregates institutional equity data feeds for its stock perps and publishes mark and index prices on-chain. The protocol enforces that oracle updates happen at a minimum frequency and within sane bounds, and the stake is the deployer's skin in the game. But ultimately the price your position is marked against comes from the builder, not from the core team.

Leverage, margin and market parameters

The deployer chooses the maximum leverage and the margin tiers. Most stock and commodity perps launched at 3x–10x and have gradually been raised; as of September 2026, XYZ100 and the SP500-style index perps offer up to roughly 20x, single stocks generally 5x–20x, and pre-IPO perps sit lower because their oracles are less liquid. Isolated and cross margin both work, and liquidation follows the standard Hyperliquid rules (maintenance margin at half of initial margin at max leverage), which we explain in the leverage and liquidation guide.

Fees: up to 50% deployer share

HIP-3 markets charge the standard Hyperliquid taker/maker schedule, and the deployer can take a share of the fee revenue, up to 50%. In practice deployers set an additional builder fee that shows up in your trade confirmation. On top of that, apps that route orders can attach their own builder codes, which is a separate mechanism (a per-order fee an interface charges) that also works on HIP-3 markets. Full tiers and discounts are in our Hyperliquid fees guide; in short, a HIP-3 stock perp costs slightly more per trade than a BTC perp, and the difference goes to the builder.

Isolated risk

Every deployer's markets are margined in their own bucket: a blow-up in a builder market cannot drain the HLP vault that backstops native perps, and xyz:NVDA does not share collateral with BTC unless you use cross margin within that deployer's DEX.

HIP-3 growth: from launch to over a third of Hyperliquid volume

HIP-3 went live on mainnet on October 13, 2025, days after the October 10 crash had stress-tested the exchange, with trade.xyz listing a handful of US equity perps and the XYZ100 index. Two things then drove adoption: pre-IPO perps (SpaceX, then Anthropic and OpenAI) gave traders their only venue for private-company exposure, and the early-2026 memory-chip supercycle made xyz:MU, xyz:SNDK, xyz:SKHY (SK hynix), KIOXIA and the DRAM index some of the most traded tickers on the platform.

By mid-2026, HIP-3 markets represented more than 35% of total Hyperliquid perp volume, occasionally exceeding native crypto perps on volatile US market days. That matters for HYPE holders because HIP-3 fees flow to Assistance Fund buybacks like all perp fees, and every new deployer locks another 500,000 HYPE. For the revenue impact, see Hyperliquid revenue, volume and valuation.

HIP-3 deployers: who is building on the Hyperliquid ecosystem

The table below lists the main deployers and builders as of September 2026. "Deployer" means the team has staked and operates its own HIP-3 markets; "builder" means the team builds products around HIP-3 or the broader Hyperliquid ecosystem.

A few notes on the names people search for most:

Hyperliquid xyz / trade xyz. trade.xyz is a separate company that built the institutional-grade oracle and market operations for equities. Its markets appear in the app under the xyz: prefix, and its own site offers a stock-focused front-end routing to the same on-chain books; "trade xyz hyperliquid" means trading these markets through either interface. The xyz docs cover oracle methodology, corporate actions (splits, dividends) and trading-hours conventions; we summarize the trading side on our stocks on Hyperliquid and S&P 500 and Nasdaq index perps pages.

XYZ100 vs "hyperliquid xyz sp500". XYZ100 tracks the S&P 100 and is the most liquid US index perp on Hyperliquid. A separate SP500-style perp exists with a different oracle, but liquidity concentrates in XYZ100.

Ventuals / vntl. Ventuals specialises in pre-IPO perps and pioneered the valuation-based oracle that marks a private company to its latest funding-round and secondary pricing. It was the first place many traders could go long or short SpaceX.

Project X (prjx) and Based. Front-ends rather than pure deployers: Project X runs a HyperEVM DEX and trading terminal, Based a mobile app that hides wallet management. Both earn via builder codes on the orders they route.

For the broader map of HyperEVM DeFi apps, see our HyperEVM ecosystem guide.

How to trade a HIP-3 market (xyz:NVDA example)

Trading a builder market is nearly identical to trading a native perp. The steps assume a funded account; if not, start with the bridge and deposit guide.

1. Open the perps list and type the ticker with its deployer prefix: xyz:NVDA, xyz:XYZ100, xyz:CL or vntl:SPACEX. The prefix tells you whose oracle and fee schedule you are using.
2. Check the market details panel for oracle source, funding interval, max leverage, open-interest caps and builder fee. For stocks, note whether the oracle is live (US market hours) or frozen at the last close.
3. Choose margin mode. Isolated margin is the safer default for stock perps because it caps your loss at the margin you assign.
4. Set leverage. Even if 20x is offered, most experienced traders keep stock perps at 2x–5x; a 10% earnings gap at 10x is a liquidation.
5. Place the order. Limit orders pay maker (0.015% base) plus the builder share; market orders pay taker (0.045% base) plus the builder share. Take-profit, stop-loss, TWAP and scale orders work as on BTC.
6. Watch funding. HIP-3 markets pay funding hourly; because stock perps drift from the underlying while the cash market is closed, weekend funding can be unusually skewed.

👉 Open the Hyperliquid app and save 4% on fees

If you prefer to automate, the same markets are reachable through the API; see the API section below and our full Hyperliquid API guide.

HIP-3 risks you should understand before trading

HIP-3 markets are on-chain and non-custodial, but they carry risks that native crypto perps do not. This is not a reason to avoid them, but you should size positions with these in mind.

Oracle risk

The deployer publishes the price. If the feed lags, glitches or is manipulated, your position is marked against a wrong number. The 500,000 HYPE stake and slashing are the deterrent, and trade.xyz uses multi-source institutional feeds, but the trust assumption is real, and during earnings, halts or circuit breakers an oracle can print prices that never traded in the cash market.

Deployer risk

Deployers can adjust leverage, margin tiers and open-interest caps, and in extreme cases pause or delist a market; HIP-3 Star expanded these powers. A well-run deployer uses them to protect traders, a badly run one could misuse them. Read the deployer's docs and follow their announcements.

Liquidity risk

Native BTC and ETH perps have tens of millions of dollars of depth within a few basis points; a niche stock or pre-IPO perp may have a few hundred thousand. Slippage is higher and a large liquidation can move the book, so use limit orders and check depth before sizing up.

Off-hours pricing

US stocks trade roughly 9:30–16:00 ET on weekdays; Hyperliquid trades 24/7. Outside those hours a HIP-3 stock perp is effectively a bet on where the stock will open, with the oracle frozen at the last close while the perp price floats, and overnight news can leave you with a move you cannot hedge until the open. Commodities have their own session gaps; pre-IPO perps have no continuous underlying at all.

Regulatory and delisting risk

Equity and pre-IPO perps sit in a legal grey zone in many jurisdictions; the app already geo-blocks the US, and a regulatory shift could lead deployers to restrict markets. Our KYC and US availability guide covers the current situation, including the Kraken/Bitnomial talks reported by Bloomberg on August 31, 2026.

Risk note: leveraged perps on stocks, commodities and private companies can lose your entire margin in a single gap. Never trade with money you cannot afford to lose.

HIP-3 Star: the August 2026 update

Over its first ten months HIP-3 received incremental upgrades: per-market open-interest caps, a lower effective stake for deployers with a track record, better corporate-action handling and tighter oracle bounds. In August 2026 the core team shipped a larger package the community nicknamed HIP-3 Star.

The gist is more deployer control. Deployers can now define custom margin schedules per market (for example, higher maintenance margin into earnings), configure behaviour when the underlying is closed, set per-market fee tiers and run several order-book configurations under one stake. Front-end display of deployer parameters was also standardized so xyz, vntl and felix markets look consistent in the app.

For traders, each HIP-3 market's rules can now differ more, so the market details panel matters more. For builders, HIP-3 Star enables sophisticated products (basket-style indices, event-driven margin) without a protocol change.

HIP-5, HIP-6 and what comes after HIP-3

Searches for "hyperliquid hip 5" and "hip 6 hyperliquid" have grown through 2026, and it is worth being precise about what is and is not confirmed.

HIP-4 is real and live: it is the outcome-market standard that launched on May 2, 2026 with Outcome.xyz's daily BTC market. If you are looking for the Hyperliquid prediction market, that is the standard to read about, and we cover it in depth in HIP-4 prediction markets on Hyperliquid.

HIP-5 and HIP-6 are best described, as of September 2026, as later proposals that extend the market standards. Community and developer discussion has touched on richer collateral types for builder markets, options-style payoffs and tighter HyperEVM integration, but none of it is final until it appears in the official docs or a core-team announcement. We will update this section when specifications are published; be sceptical of anyone selling a definitive "HIP-6 explained" guide.

HIP-3 API differences for developers

If you trade programmatically, HIP-3 markets are reachable through the same endpoints as native perps, with a few differences worth knowing. Full detail is in the Hyperliquid API guide and the official docs.

• Asset naming. In meta and metaAndAssetCtxs responses, HIP-3 assets carry their deployer prefix (xyz:NVDA). Your code must handle the colon; older bots that split on non-alphanumeric characters break here.
• Separate DEX namespace. Each deployer runs a logical "perp DEX" within HyperCore. Some info endpoints accept a dex parameter to scope results; omit it for native perps. Account state and margin are reported per DEX.
• Order placement. The /exchange payload is unchanged; reference the asset by its index within the relevant DEX. Rate limits (1,200 weight/min per IP on /info, address-based on /exchange) apply as elsewhere.
• Oracle and mark price. Asset contexts include the deployer's oracle price and funding rate; check timestamps to detect a stale oracle outside trading hours.
• Builder fees. The builder-code mechanism (a per-order fee the user approves once) works on HIP-3 markets exactly as on native ones. This "hyperliquid builder codes" feature is separate from the deployer's fee share.
• WebSocket. l2Book, trades and candle subscriptions accept prefixed coin names. Test on testnet first; see our testnet guide.

The official Python SDK (GitHub hyperliquid-dex) supports prefixed assets. The "hip 3 hyperliquid docs" you want are the HIP-3 section of the GitBook plus each deployer's own oracle documentation.

Bottom line

HIP-3 lets well-capitalized builders deploy perpetual futures on almost anything with a price feed, and in under a year it has made Hyperliquid the largest on-chain venue for stock, index, commodity and pre-IPO perps. The trade-off is that you are trusting the deployer's oracle and parameters rather than the core protocol's, so read the market details, prefer isolated margin and keep leverage modest, especially outside US market hours. As of September 2026, trade.xyz's xyz markets dominate, Ventuals owns the pre-IPO niche, and HIP-3 Star has given deployers even more room to innovate. If you understand the risks, builder markets are one of the most compelling reasons to use Hyperliquid over any other DEX.