Original Title: Unpopular Take: Why HYPE Won't Do A 2X From Here
Original Author: Catrina
Translation: Peggy, BlockBeats

Editor's Note: HYPE remains one of the most talked-about assets in the cryptocurrency market recently. According to CoinGecko data, the price of HYPE has been hovering around $42, with gains of approximately 8% in the past 7 days and 16.8% in the past 30 days. It has a market capitalization of about $10.1 billion and has been touted as one of the hottest crypto trades of the year, with HYPE recording a roughly 60% gain even in the broader crypto bear market.

However, starting from the price structure, the author questions its upward potential: the 75% of the token supply that is still locked implies ongoing selling pressure in the future; the current Fully Diluted Valuation (FDV) is approaching or even exceeding the valuation range of some traditional exchanges; and at this price point, the clear origin of new marginal buyers, whether retail, traditional institutions, or crypto funds, still lacks a definitive answer.

More notably, HYPE faces not only valuation issues but also risks such as regulation, hacking attacks, key personnel dependence, and trader liquidity migration. For an asset that has already received ample market attention and has been heavily promoted by Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs), the real question is no longer "whether it has a narrative" but "who will continue to buy at this price."

The value of this article lies in providing a sober contrarian view: when a crypto asset transitions from alpha to consensus, what investors need to reassess is not just how excellent the project itself is, but whether the current price has already priced in the future.

Below is the original text:

Previously, I moved this article to Substack because the viewpoint is quite controversial, and I am not the type of person who enjoys arguing on Twitter. But in the end, I decided to move it back to Twitter. I want to publicly document my thoughts, regardless of whether they are right or wrong.

Writing this article will not make me more friends. Many people I admire in the Crypto community are staunch HYPE bulls, and I have no motivation to FUD it at all. I write this because amidst the fervor in Crypto Twitter, someone has to provide a more level-headed perspective. Here, I have organized my contrarian views on HYPE into a complete article.

Firstly, I do not deny that HYPE is arguably one of the most impressive projects currently. All the following content is not an evaluation of HYPE's fundamentals as a business but merely an objective assessment of its price trend.

Straight to the Point: HYPE isn't cheap. I don't think it can double from its current price, meaning it won't go from today's $40 and double up. Price might spike briefly over 2x when market sentiment gets exuberant, but in a relatively reasonable range, in the long term, chances are it will enter a prolonged consolidation phase below $80. And that is an optimistic view. Here's why:

75% of Tokens Yet to Be Unlocked, Bringing About 3x the Selling Pressure

HYPE currently has an FDV of about $40 billion, but only 25% is circulating, with token unlocking scheduled until 2028.

Let's do a basic sanity check with a few comparables:

·CME's historical peak valuation is around $118 billion, about 3x HYPE's current FDV;

·ICE's historical peak valuation is around $107 billion, around 2.5x HYPE's;

·Nasdaq's historical peak valuation is about $57 billion, around 1.5x HYPE's.

For someone buying HYPE today expecting a 2x return, they must assume:

·Either the HYPE team never sells tokens; or the future 3x additional net selling pressure from the team unlocking requires 6x marginal buying pressure to absorb; or some scenario in between;

·HYPE not only needs to surpass Nasdaq but also approach CME's historical highs. Keep in mind, CME is the world's largest derivatives exchange, processing over $1 quadrillion in notional trading volume annually and backed by a 130-year regulatory moat.

So the real question is: Who are the marginal buyers at this price?

Market buyers are roughly divided into two categories: retail and institutional.

·Retail: What "secret" or "alpha" is left to trigger new buys now? Almost everyone, including their grandma, knows HYPE is the star project in crypto. HYPE is no longer anyone's secret. There might be some sideline buyers left, but how many?

·Institutional: This segment might truly change the game. Institutional buyers here can be divided into two categories:

i. Wall Street hedge funds or mutual funds;

ii. Crypto Hedge Funds

For the first type, I highly doubt traditional asset management firms would touch the HYPE, as it operates in a non-compliant gray area. The lack of KYC and regulatory arbitrage is indeed an advantage for its rapid growth, but can donor funds and mutual funds really accept and endorse this level of risk? You could say PURR is an on-ramp, but that depends on their own risk tolerance, which I cannot judge.

Even if they were willing to buy, do you think these Wall Street veterans would compare HYPE to whom? It wouldn't be BNB; it's more likely to be Nasdaq, whose all-time high is only 1.5 times the current FDV of HYPE; going higher, it might only just compare to CME, whose historical peak is less than 3 times the HYPE.

As for the second type, you can ask any rational crypto hedge fund manager on CT: will they still hold when HYPE FDV reaches $80 billion? Even if they want to hold, they must trim their positions out of fiduciary duty to LPs. Anticipating HYPE, such a non-compliant perpetual swap exchange, surpassing CME in valuation would seem quite unrealistic to LPs.

So tell me: where are these marginal buyers coming from? And we need a lot of such buyers.

Hacking Risk on the Rise

Whether it's the Lazarus Group or the potential future Mythos-level AI hacking capability, if someone were to attack crypto, where do you think the biggest honeypot would be?

Not to Mention Key Man Risk

Key man risk at Hyperliquid is already considered one of the most severe types in crypto. Jeff leads a team of 11, adheres to a product-first, no-VC philosophy, and every part of the infrastructure—matching engine, validator code, execution logic—is built in-house.

If something were to go wrong, is there public documentation on the back-end knowledge transfer? Of course, let's hope nothing like that ever happens.

Yan is the sole strategic and technical anchor of a protocol that processes over $10 billion in daily transaction volume. There are no named co-founders, no visible succession plan, and no governance oversight. I sincerely hope Jeff is allocating a significant portion of profits toward security and protection.

Crypto Traders Are Essentially Mercenaries

For projects trying to retain users, blockchain interoperability is definitely a bug, not a feature. At some point, traders will perceive that the HYPE's upside potential is becoming too slow, and then shift liquidity to the next potential 10x target.

In crypto, network effects are not stable. I have written a lot about this issue before.

As for those who use BNB as a comparison—please, this is not a valid benchmark, for three reasons:

BNB has already been 100% unlocked, with no additional net selling pressure; whereas the circulating supply of HYPE is only about 24%.

Binance is willing to do much more for BNB and will actively support its ascent to the top; whereas HYPE is closer to a laissez-faire strategy.

Regarding price action, the most important question remains: "Who is the marginal buyer?" For rational institutional buyers, the comparable entities would be CME/Nasdaq, not BNB.

In summary, if I were an investor:

If I were to buy crypto and hold for many years, why would I choose HYPE? It still has about 76% of tokens yet to be unlocked, meaning approximately 3x of net supply pressure. In contrast, why not choose BTC at $70,000? BTC is the only digital gold, fully circulated, without central control, and entirely irreplaceable. Just to maintain its current price, HYPE would need to find 3x new net buyers.

If I were to buy a crypto that could potentially 10x, why would I choose a token with a fully diluted valuation of $400 billion, extremely high consensus, increasing competition in DEX, and every KOL shilling their own bags? Instead, why not pick a memecoin that has dropped over 90% from its peak, has Lindy effect, strong meme attributes, and sufficient volatility?

You can ask those shilling KOLs: Would they buy HYPE at this price?

HYPE has made many people wealthy. So, the real question you should ask yourself is: Who will provide the exit liquidity for them?

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