In his view, the biggest threat to the progress of cryptocurrencies is not a sudden “black swan” event, a rare and unexpected collapse, but something more gradual and alarming: irrelevance.
“If Hyperliquid fails, it won’t be because of the protocol,” Yan said. “Maybe it’s because we haven’t created anything of real value to the world.”
Gradual decline poses greater risk
HyperLiquid, a decentralized derivatives exchange built on a proprietary blockchain, has grown rapidly over the past year. But Yang’s comments reflect a deep concern shared by many founders in the DeFi space that innovation can stall if projects fail to solve real-world problems. He described “marginalization” as a slow loss of relevance, a future in which DeFi exists, but few people care because it doesn’t offer enough value beyond speculation.
This idea resonates at a time when global DeFi activity has plateaued. According to DeFiLlama, total value locked (TVL) across all protocols has hovered around $70 billion for several months, well below the 2021 peak of $180 billion. The excitement around yield farming and token launches has faded, and projects that once promised to reshape finance are now struggling to find sustainable use cases.
Yang believes that the next phase of DeFi should focus on long-term utility rather than hype. He urged developers to reduce their reliance on off-chain assumptions, such as external price feeds and opaque collateral, and instead build directly verifiable systems on the blockchain. This means greater transparency, greater data consistency, and fewer points of failure.
Learn more about Hyperliquid
Hyperliquid has added a new trading pair, MEGA-USD hyperps, allowing users to go long or short the upcoming MegaETH token before its official launch. Traders will now be able to speculate on the future price of MegaETH with up to 3x leverage, giving them a way to hedge their exposures and positions ahead of the token’s debut.
At the request of the community, Hyperliquid has listed the MEGA-USD hyperp. You can now go long or short unreleased MegaETH tokens with up to 3x leverage. pic.twitter.com/PUWToNdmd0
— Hyperliquid (@HyperliquidX) October 22, 2025
The move highlights Hyperliquid’s growing role in providing an innovative on-chain derivatives market that allows users to trade synthetic versions of prospective assets in a fully decentralized environment.
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The article Hyperliquid says DeFi risks are irrelevant with no real value was originally published on Altcoin Buzz.