According to Arthur Hayes, co-founder of BitMEX Exchange and CIO of the Maelstrom fund, leading decentralized exchange Hyperliquid’s push toward prediction markets is about who captures the upside, not just the cheapest trade.
CoinDesk previously reported that Hyperliquid is preparing a fee-free opening model for event trading under HIP-4. The Hyperliquid Improvement Proposal (HIP)-4 is a proposal that introduces event trading to Hyperliquid.
Hayes said the structure is just the first layer. In a note to CoinDesk, he argued that the real differentiator is HYPE, Hyperliquid’s exchange token, which he said allows users to benefit from the platform’s activity in a way that Polymarket and Kalshi do not currently do.
“HIP-4 will quickly become a dominant prediction market due to Hyperliquid’s large user base, much cheaper trading fees, and very strong technological infrastructure,” Hayes told CoinDesk. “Users who own the $HYPE token can directly benefit from the use of HIP-4.”
Polymarket is expected to launch a token, often referred to as $POLY.
On Gate, pre-market perpetual contracts tied to a potential $POLY token are trading around $14, implying a fully diluted valuation of approximately $14 billion. HYPE, by comparison, has an FDV of around $38 billion, according to data from CoinGecko.
Pre-listing markets are typically highly speculative and lightly traded, meaning any implied valuations should be treated with caution and may not reliably reflect actual market demand.
The argument also comes down to geography. Polymarket registered with the CFTC last July and is rebuilding its US business, putting compliance at the center of its strategy.
However, in Asia it is still grappling with how regulators classify its product. It is geo-blocked in Singapore, Thailand and Taiwan, partially restricted in Japan. Meanwhile, in Hong Kong, prediction markets in general are on the radar of gambling regulators.
Hyperliquid faces no equivalent restrictions and its user base skews towards Asia, where cryptocurrency trading is already deep.
The contrast is clearer with Kalshi.
As a CFTC-regulated exchange, Kalshi’s model is based on compliance and licensing, not token incentives, which likely rules out the kind of value accumulation layer that Hayes points to.
That makes it the most direct proof of his thesis. Users can trade event results on Kalshi, but they have no path to the upside of the platform itself. In traditional markets, those types of benefits are typically accessed through equity, such as an IPO, although for now, Kalshi users’ participation is limited to trading on the platform.
Between the three platforms, the division is structural: Hyperliquid already ties usage to a token, Polymarket appears to be moving in that direction, and Kalshi’s model likely prevents this entirely.
