Hyperliquid Strategies, a Nasdaq-listed company that holds the HYPE token as its main treasury asset, has applied to register a subsidiary as a US futures broker.
The firm disclosed the application in its third-quarter results on Thursday, 5 November. The unit has applied to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to become a futures commission merchant, a type of broker that holds customer funds and handles futures orders.
If approved, the unit would hold accounts for US clients trading permissioned markets built on Hyperliquid, letting Americans trade perpetual futures within a regulated set-up.
Why it wants a broker
More US trading on Hyperliquid would likely mean more fees for the protocol, which uses its fees to buy back HYPE. A broker business would also give Hyperliquid Strategies a source of revenue beyond simply holding tokens.
“Those two moves are the same bet,” said chief executive David Schamis, referring to the broker application and the company’s HYPE purchases.
The company is chaired by Bob Diamond, the former chief executive of Barclays, and trades under the ticker PURR.
A strong quarter
Hyperliquid Strategies held about 38.5 million HYPE at the end of September, worth roughly $3.5 billion.
During the quarter it spent $785 million buying 9.1 million HYPE, and $17 million buying back 2.7 million of its own shares. It funded most of this with $911 million raised from selling new shares.
The company reported net income of $620.6 million, driven by $803 million in unrealised gains as the HYPE price rose from about $65 to $91.
Part of a wider push
The move is part of a broader effort to bring regulated US trading to Hyperliquid. Hyperliquid’s HIP-3 system lets outside firms launch their own perpetual futures markets on the network after staking HYPE, and a permissioned version, HIP-3*, would be run by a regulated operator.
Last week, Intercontinental Exchange, the owner of the New York Stock Exchange, agreed to work with Trade XYZ on US perpetual futures built on Hyperliquid.
What happens next
Regulators would need to approve both the broker registration and the permissioned markets it would serve. Hyperliquid Strategies had not given a timeline for either at the time of writing.
