画像を読み込み中Grayscale’s Zach Pandl says Hyperliquid could fill the AI compute derivatives gap

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Grayscale's research chief sees onchain perpetual futures as a way to hedge one of the hottest inputs in the AI economy

Mon 9 Nov 2026 · 09:28 EST · 3 min read

In Technology

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AI compute has become one of the most valuable resources in the global economy. Oddly, there is almost no mature way to hedge it.

Zach Pandl, Head of Research at Grayscale, thinks Hyperliquid can help change that. In a talk on November 9, 2026, he argued the decentralized exchange is positioned to bring AI compute derivatives onchain and address a major gap in the market.

What Pandl actually said

Pandl made his case during a discussion with a16z’s Guy Wuollet Jr. His core point: AI compute is growing in importance within financial markets, but the derivatives market tied to it remains in its infancy.

Pandl pointed to platforms like Hyperliquid and OrnnExchange as candidates to fill that void. Both aim to offer AI compute exposure through perpetual futures.

For the uninitiated, a perpetual future is a derivative contract with no expiry date. Traders can hold a position on the price of an asset indefinitely, without owning the asset itself.

Applied to compute, that could mean a contract that tracks the rental cost of high-end GPUs. Data on GPU rental prices, such as those for Nvidia’s H100, is part of the groundwork for pricing these products.

Hyperliquid’s numbers make the pitch

Hyperliquid isn’t starting from zero. It runs a decentralized perpetual futures exchange on its own layer-1 blockchain, powered by its native HYPE token.

The key piece of plumbing here is HIP-3, a framework launched in October 2025. It lets Hyperliquid list perpetual markets well beyond crypto, including equities, commodities, indices and other assets.

HIP-3 markets have reached a peak open interest of $3.2 billion. Open interest measures the total value of outstanding contracts, so it’s a rough gauge of how much money is actually committed to positions.

Cumulative volume on non-crypto perpetuals has passed $200 billion as of late 2026. That’s a meaningful figure for a product category that was barely a year old.

The broader business has been healthy too. Hyperliquid generated approximately $800 million to $857 million in revenue in 2025. Outsourced revenue streams hit $38 million in September 2026.

Grayscale has noticed. The asset manager has described Hyperliquid as a “breakout success story,” and offers exposure to it through its HYPG staking ETF, which carries a sponsor fee of 0.29%.

Worth flagging: Grayscale has a product tied to Hyperliquid’s success. That doesn’t make Pandl’s analysis wrong, but readers should weigh it accordingly.

The regulatory groundwork

The Hyperliquid Policy Center appears to understand this. On October 20, 2026, it filed a comment letter with the CFTC advocating for regulated compute perpetuals and futures.

What to watch

For HYPE holders and Hyperliquid watchers, a few things stand out.

First, the competitive field. Pandl named OrnnExchange alongside Hyperliquid, which signals this won’t be a one-horse race.

Second, the pricing problem. GPU rental rates vary by provider, region, contract length and hardware generation, so building a trusted benchmark is harder than tracking, say, the price of gold.

Third, regulation. The CFTC’s response to the Hyperliquid Policy Center’s letter could shape whether institutional players feel comfortable participating.

Disclosure: This article was edited by Diego Almada Lopez. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.