Hyperliquid rises 5% amid Middle East tensions… outperforming Bitcoin

The native token of decentralized derivatives exchange Hyperliquid (HYPE) posted returns over the weekend that outpaced Bitcoin (BTC) and the broader market.

According to CoinDesk on the 2nd (local time), Hyperliquid gained as much as 5% over the past 24 hours. By contrast, Bitcoin fell 0.7% to trade around $66,700, while the CoinDesk 20 Index slipped 1.7% to 1,937 points.

Hyperliquid has a mechanism that allocates a portion of trading fees to buy back and burn Hyperliquid tokens. As a result, when trading activity—such as crude oil futures—surges, fee revenue rises while the token’s circulating supply declines.

According to DefiLlama, Hyperliquid generated $2.8 million in fees over the past 24 hours and more than $13 million over the past seven days. Over the same period, roughly $9.22 million worth of Hyperliquid tokens were burned, up 20.4% from the previous period.

The expanded burn appears to partially offset concerns over a roughly $316 million token unlock scheduled for this week. About 9.92 million HYPE (2.7% of the pre-minted supply) is set to be unlocked, but past cases suggest the actual increase in circulation was smaller than expected. As a result, the market is betting that net circulating supply is unlikely to rise sharply.

A similar pattern has been observed in Jupiter (JUP). Jupiter has risen 13% over the past week, and through a governance vote at the end of February, it decided to halt new issuance (net issuance increases) in 2026. This is a supply-discipline strategy aimed at blocking additional tokens from entering circulation and is seen as a key narrative behind the recent strength in some altcoins.