Decentralized trade Aster has caught merchants’ consideration due to its eye-watering 1,001x leverage choices, help from Binance co-founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, and a hovering token.
Attributable to its deal with perpetual futures buying and selling, Aster is taken into account a rival to Hyperliquid—which has been one of the vital profitable crypto initiatives of the 12 months. Throughout its first week, it flipped Hyperliquid in each day income however remained behind by way of buying and selling quantity.
Due to its explosive begin, in response to CoinGecko, its Aster token surged to a $3.2 billion market cap because the fiftieth largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization—not dangerous for per week’s work.
So, what precisely is Aster? What even is a perpetual future? How does Aster match up in opposition to Hyperliquid? And what’s subsequent? Right here’s a have a look at the favored BNB Chain trade.
Aster is a decentralized trade that helps a number of chains, together with Solana, Ethereum, and Arbitrum, however is most carefully tied to BNB Chain. It makes a speciality of perpetual futures buying and selling, though it additionally presents spot buying and selling. The venture is backed by YZi Labs, the crypto funding agency of Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, who co-founded Binance.
Perpetual futures permit merchants to take a position on the value of cryptocurrencies with out proudly owning the underlying asset—be it Bitcoin, Ethereum, or every other obtainable token. Conventional futures require an expiration date, whereas perpetual futures don’t. That mentioned, merchants nonetheless have to pick out in the event that they wish to quick (that means the value will drop) or lengthy (the value will rise) the chosen asset.
Aster Token Skyrockets to New Excessive After Flipping Hyperliquid in Income—Will the Value Double Once more?
On high of this, perpetual futures have develop into carefully tied to extremely leveraged trades—with Aster’s max leverage set at a whopping 1,001x.
Aster exploded in reputation in September 2025, with the debut of its token that soared 2,000% in its first seven days to $3.8 billion market capitalization. On the time of writing, it has settled at a greater than $3 billion market cap, which makes it the fiftieth largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization.
With its success, Aster has naturally been in comparison with Hyperliquid—which has established itself because the main decentralized trade specializing in perpetual futures.
On the time of writing, in late September 2025, Aster’s weekly buying and selling quantity sits at $3.32 billion, behind Hyperliquid at $5.39 billion. That mentioned, in response to DefiLlama, it has surpassed the rival trade in each day income on a number of days since its launch.
What Is Hyperliquid? The Decentralized Trade With Its Personal Blockchain
So what’s the distinction? First, Aster operates natively on 4 networks, decreasing friction for merchants to get began, whereas Hyperliquid has its personal blockchain powering the trade. That mentioned, Aster does have goals to finally launch its personal layer-1 community.
One other main distinction is that Aster seems to have a stronger deal with privateness, with the launch of Hidden Orders permitting for personal trades to be positioned. In contrast, Hyperliquid’s extremely clear mannequin has been, partly, its power because it caught headlines as a result of whales inserting eye-popping bets.
Nevertheless, CZ informed Farokh Sarmad of Rug Radio—Decrypt’s sister firm—in a video interview in Could that Hyperliquid’s clear mannequin will not be optimum for giant trades.
“The present mannequin the place every little thing is totally clear could or will not be the most effective mannequin,” the Binance co-founder mentioned. “Yeah, you possibly can see a giant whale place a $300 million quick. However the man who actually desires to do a $300 million quick doesn’t need you to see it.”
On high of this, Aster’s most leverage is a dizzying 1,001x whereas Hyperliquid tops out at 40x. To place that into perspective, the best that the centralized trade Binance presents is 20x, and it’s a must to go sure necessities to take action.
Aster has gotten off to a sizzling begin, but it surely has massive plans to maintain constructing.
A transfer to a devoted layer-1 community would be the most important change to the decentralized trade, and can be a notable transfer away from BNB Chain—which is tied to Binance, which CZ co-founded.
Actual particulars on this transfer are nonetheless pretty underneath wraps, with Aster’s official docs merely saying “coming quickly.” Aster Chain is at the moment in an inner testing part, the trade’s CEO Leonard informed Cointelegraph. Leonard mentioned it’s being designed to “protect commerce privateness.”
Aster vs Hyperliquid: BNB Chain DEX Perps Quantity Derails the HYPE Practice
What customers are possible most excited for, although, is the potential of an Aster airdrop.
After its token technology occasion, a portion of the token provide was airdropped to those who had participated in earlier airdrop campaigns. On October 17, the airdrop declare interval will shut and any unclaimed tokens will return to the neighborhood rewards pool—which accounts for 53.5% of its whole provide.
As such, customers are anticipating one other spherical of airdrops to happen someday after the October declare interval closes. And a few merchants are already making an attempt to farm it.
Whether or not you’re farming the airdrop, eagerly anticipating the brand new layer-1 community, or simply buying and selling with insane leverage, Aster has lots in retailer for customers. Whether or not it in the end has the identical type of long-term influence as Hyperliquid stays to be seen, nonetheless.
