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Yesterday — 24 January 2026Main stream

Spot vs Perpetual Trading on Hyperliquid: What Every Trader Must Understand

By: MintonFin
24 January 2026 at 06:50
Spot vs Perpetual Trading on Hyperliquid

One wrong choice between spot and perpetual trading can silently drain your capital — especially on a high-performance platform like Hyperliquid.

Hyperliquid has rapidly emerged as one of the most talked-about decentralized trading platforms in crypto. With lightning-fast execution, deep liquidity, and a fully on-chain order book, it attracts everyone from casual traders to highly leveraged professionals.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth most guides don’t tell you:

  • Spot and perpetual trading on Hyperliquid are not interchangeable.
  • They reward completely different mindsets, risk tolerances, and time horizons.
  • Choosing the wrong one can turn a profitable strategy into a liquidation event.

In this guide, you’ll learn exactly how spot trading and perpetual trading work on Hyperliquid, how they differ, and most importantly, which one aligns with your goals, capital structure, and psychology as a trader.

Whether you’re a long-term crypto holder, an active DeFi participant, or an advanced derivatives trader, this article will help you make smarter, safer, and more profitable decisions on Hyperliquid.

What Is Hyperliquid?

Hyperliquid is a decentralized exchange (DEX) optimized for high-performance spot and perpetual futures trading, built with a custom Layer-1 blockchain designed specifically for trading.

Unlike many DeFi platforms that rely on AMMs (automated market makers), Hyperliquid uses a fully on-chain central limit order book (CLOB) — similar to Binance or OKX, but decentralized.

Key Features of Hyperliquid

  • Fully on-chain order book
  • Ultra-low latency execution
  • Deep liquidity for major trading pairs
  • Spot trading and perpetual futures in one interface
  • No KYC required
  • Non-custodial (you control your funds)

This hybrid design makes Hyperliquid uniquely powerful — but also more complex than typical DeFi platforms.

Understanding spot vs perpetual trading is critical before using it seriously.

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Spot Trading Explained (Hyperliquid Spot Markets)

What Is Spot Trading?

Spot trading means buying or selling an asset for immediate settlement at the current market price.

When you buy ETH on the spot market:

  • You own the ETH
  • It appears directly in your wallet
  • There is no leverage
  • No liquidation risk

How Spot Trading Works on Hyperliquid

On Hyperliquid’s spot market:

  • You trade crypto pairs (e.g., ETH/USDC)
  • Trades settle instantly on-chain
  • Assets are fully owned by you
  • Profits and losses are unrealized until you sell

Spot Trading Example

If you:

  • Buy ETH at $2,500
  • Hold it for three months
  • Sell at $3,000

Your profit is simply:

($3,000 — $2,500) × ETH amount

No funding rates. No margin calls. No forced liquidation.

Advantages of Spot Trading on Hyperliquid

Spot trading is often underestimated — especially in a derivatives-driven market.

1. Zero Liquidation Risk

Your position cannot be forcibly closed due to volatility.

This makes spot trading ideal for:

  • Long-term investors
  • Conservative traders
  • Portfolio builders

2. Full Asset Ownership

You actually own the underlying crypto, which means:

  • You can withdraw anytime
  • You can move assets to cold storage
  • You can use them in DeFi elsewhere

3. Simple Risk Management

Your maximum loss is limited to your initial investment.

No leverage = no surprise margin calls.

4. Ideal for Market Cycles

Spot trading excels during:

  • Bull markets
  • Accumulation phases
  • Long-term trend formation

Disadvantages of Spot Trading

Despite its safety, spot trading has limitations.

1. Capital Inefficiency

Without leverage:

  • Returns are slower
  • Large capital is needed for meaningful gains

2. No Short Selling (in pure spot)

You cannot profit from falling prices unless:

  • You sell an asset you already own
  • Or rotate into stablecoins

3. Opportunity Cost

Capital tied in spot positions can’t be redeployed quickly for short-term trades.

Perpetual Trading Explained (Hyperliquid Perps)

What Are Perpetual Futures?

Perpetual contracts (perps) are derivative instruments that track the price of an asset without expiration.

You do NOT own the underlying asset.

Instead, you:

  • Open long or short positions
  • Use margin
  • Trade price movement only

How Perpetual Trading Works on Hyperliquid

Hyperliquid’s perpetual markets allow:

  • High leverage
  • Long and short positions
  • Cross-margin and isolated margin
  • Continuous funding payments

Key Components

  • Margin: Collateral posted to open a position
  • Leverage: Borrowed exposure (e.g., 10x, 20x)
  • Funding Rate: Periodic payments between longs and shorts
  • Liquidation Price: Price at which your position is forcibly closed

Perpetual Trading Example

You:

  • Deposit $1,000
  • Open a 10x long on ETH
  • Control $10,000 worth of ETH exposure

If ETH rises 5%:

  • Your profit ≈ 50%

If ETH drops ~10%:

  • Your position is liquidated
  • Your capital is gone

Advantages of Perpetual Trading on Hyperliquid

1. Leverage Amplifies Returns

Perps allow:

  • Faster capital growth
  • Efficient use of capital
  • Aggressive strategies

2. Ability to Short the Market

You can profit from:

  • Bear markets
  • Downtrends
  • Market corrections

This is critical for professional traders.

3. High Liquidity and Tight Spreads

Hyperliquid’s order book provides:

  • Minimal slippage
  • Institutional-grade execution

4. Advanced Trading Strategies

Perpetuals support:

  • Hedging spot positions
  • Delta-neutral strategies
  • Arbitrage opportunities

Risks of Perpetual Trading

Perpetual trading is not forgiving.

1. Liquidation Risk

Small price movements can wipe out positions.

Most retail traders lose money due to:

  • Over-leverage
  • Poor stop placement
  • Emotional trading

2. Funding Rate Costs

Holding perps long-term can:

  • Erode profits
  • Turn winning trades negative

3. Psychological Pressure

Perps amplify:

  • Stress
  • Overtrading
  • Revenge trading

This is why many traders underperform despite good analysis.

Spot vs Perpetual Trading on Hyperliquid (Comparison Table)

Spot vs Perpetual Trading on Hyperliquid

Which Should You Choose on Hyperliquid?

Choose Spot Trading If:

  • You’re building long-term positions
  • You want low stress
  • You prioritize capital preservation
  • You’re new to Hyperliquid

Choose Perpetual Trading If:

  • You understand leverage deeply
  • You actively manage risk
  • You trade intraday or swing short-term
  • You have strict stop-loss discipline

Advanced Strategy: Combining Spot + Perpetuals

Professional traders often use both.

Example Hedging Strategy

  • Hold ETH spot long-term
  • Short ETH perps during market weakness
  • Reduce volatility without selling spot

This approach:

  • Protects capital
  • Preserves upside
  • Requires discipline

This is how professionals trade. Combining spot and perpetuals isn’t advanced — it’s essential.

If this strategy changed how you think about trading, clap to help it reach more serious traders.

Common Mistakes Traders Make on Hyperliquid

  1. Over-leveraging perps
  2. Using perps for long-term holding
  3. Ignoring funding rates
  4. Trading emotionally after losses
  5. Treating perps like spot

Avoiding these mistakes alone can dramatically improve performance.

Is Hyperliquid Safe for Spot and Perpetual Trading?

Hyperliquid’s non-custodial design reduces:

  • Exchange counterparty risk
  • Custody failures

However:

  • Smart contract risk exists
  • Trader behavior is the biggest risk factor

The platform isn’t dangerous — poor risk management is.

Final Thoughts: Spot vs Perpetual Trading on Hyperliquid

Hyperliquid is one of the most powerful decentralized trading platforms available today. But power cuts both ways.

  • Spot trading rewards patience and conviction
  • Perpetual trading rewards precision and discipline

Understanding the difference is not optional — it’s essential.

The traders who thrive on Hyperliquid aren’t the most aggressive. They’re the ones who choose the right tool for the right market condition.

Trade Smarter on Hyperliquid

The difference between surviving and thriving isn’t luck — it’s structure.

  • Save this guide
  • Clap if it added value
  • Follow for more no-nonsense crypto trading breakdowns

Your capital deserves better decisions.


Spot vs Perpetual Trading on Hyperliquid: What Every Trader Must Understand was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Before yesterdayMain stream

OpenSea Insider Trading Case Ends Without A Retrial – Details

23 January 2026 at 18:00

Nathaniel Chastain, a former product manager at OpenSea, will not face a retrial after federal prosecutors chose to drop their re-review of his insider trading case.

Reports say the US Attorney’s Office reached a deferred prosecution agreement with Chastain that will lead to dismissal of the charges once the agreement runs its course.

What Prosecutors Decided

Prosecutors told a Manhattan federal court they would not retry Chastain following an appeals court ruling that tossed his earlier conviction.

Under the deferred prosecution deal, the government will dismiss the case about a month after notifying the court, and Chastain has agreed to forfeit roughly 15.98 ETH tied to the trades. He has already served three months in prison from his original sentence.

How The Appeals Court Changed The Case

According to the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, the jury in the first trial had been given the wrong instructions about what the wire fraud law covers.

The judges said confidential information only counts as property under the statute when it has commercial value to the employer, and jurors might otherwise convict someone for behavior that is unethical but not criminal. That legal point is at the heart of the reversal.

Reports note that prosecutors had called the matter the first-ever insider trading case tied to NFTs. Now, lower courts and enforcement teams will have to think carefully before using traditional fraud laws to police activity in NFT markets.

The ruling highlights a gap between old statutes and new kinds of online goods, which may push lawmakers to give clearer rules for how to treat confidential business signals related to crypto platforms.

OpenSea: The Case’s Earlier Chapters

Chastain was first charged in mid-2022 after prosecutors said he bought certain NFTs before they were featured on OpenSea’s homepage, then sold them after prices rose.

He was convicted at trial in 2023 of wire fraud and money laundering and received a sentence that included three months behind bars. The US Attorney’s Office originally described the scheme as a novel use of insider knowledge in digital markets.

With the deferred prosecution agreement in place for OpenSea, prosecutors can close this chapter without a new trial.

Chastain’s forfeiture of crypto assets and his already served time mean the government has secured some remedy, while the appellate decision leaves open big questions about when private business information can be treated as property for federal fraud charges.

Legal teams, judges, and regulators are likely to keep a close eye on how similar cases are handled in the future.

Featured image from Getty Images, chart from TradingView

UBS Plans Bitcoin Trading for Select Wealth Clients

23 January 2026 at 12:06

Bitcoin Magazine

UBS Plans Bitcoin Trading for Select Wealth Clients

UBS Group AG is preparing to offer bitcoin trading to a select group of private banking clients in Switzerland.

According to a Bloomberg report citing people familiar with the matter, the Swiss banking giant has been in discussions for several months about launching a cryptocurrency trading offering and is currently in the process of selecting external partners. 

The service would initially be limited to a small subset of Swiss private banking clients, with a broader rollout possible at a later stage.

UBS has not made a final decision on implementation, the people said, and the plans remain subject to regulatory, operational, and risk considerations.

Rather than building a full digital asset stack in-house, the banks is reportedly evaluating partnerships with third-party providers that could handle trading execution, custody, and compliance. 

A partner-led model would allow the bank to offer crypto exposure while limiting balance sheet risk and operational complexity.

Such an approach mirrors strategies adopted by other major financial institutions entering the digital asset space, particularly those seeking to comply with stringent capital requirements under the Basel III framework.

Under the proposed structure, the company would initially allow eligible clients to buy and sell bitcoin (BTC) and ethereum (ETH), the two largest digital assets by market capitalization. 

Additional assets have not been discussed.

Possible UBS expansion beyond Switzerland

While the initial rollout would focus on Switzerland, Bloomberg reported that UBS is considering expanding the service to other regions, including Asia-Pacific and the United States, depending on regulatory clarity and client demand.

UBS currently manages approximately $4.7 trillion in wealth assets as of September 30, making it the largest wealth manager globally, according to Bloomberg. Even a limited crypto offering could represent a meaningful step toward broader institutional adoption of bitcoin within traditional private banking.

The bank has historically maintained a cautious stance on cryptocurrencies. 

In November 2023, UBS allowed wealthy clients in Hong Kong to trade cryptocurrency-linked exchange-traded funds, joining competitors such as HSBC, but stopped short of offering direct spot crypto trading.

A UBS spokesperson declined to comment on the specifics of the Bloomberg report but confirmed that the bank continues to explore digital asset initiatives.

“As part of UBS’s digital asset strategy, we actively monitor developments and explore initiatives that reflect client needs, regulatory developments, market trends and robust risk controls,” the spokesperson said. “We recognize the importance of distributed ledger technology like blockchain, which underpins digital assets.”

This post UBS Plans Bitcoin Trading for Select Wealth Clients first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.

7 Tokenomics Red Flags That Signal a Rug Pull

By: MintonFin
22 January 2026 at 06:38
7 Tokenomics Red Flags That Signal a Rug Pull

If you don’t understand a token’s economics, you are the exit liquidity.

Every bull cycle creates innovation.
Every bull cycle also creates perfect conditions for rug pulls.

From meme coins that vanish overnight to “next-gen DeFi protocols” that drain liquidity in minutes, most crypto scams don’t fail because of bad marketing or weak hype — they succeed because investors ignore tokenomics.

Tokenomics is where truth lives.

You can fake roadmaps.
You can fake partnerships.

But you cannot fake economic incentives forever.

This article breaks down the 7 most dangerous tokenomics red flags that consistently signal a rug pull — often weeks or months before it happens.

If you learn to spot these early, you stop chasing pumps — and start protecting capital.

What Is Tokenomics (And Why Rug Pulls Depend on It)?

Tokenomics refers to how a crypto token is designed, distributed, incentivized, and controlled.

At its core, tokenomics answers five critical questions:

  1. Who gets the tokens?
  2. When do they get them?
  3. What can they do with them?
  4. What happens when they sell?
  5. Who controls future supply?

Rug pulls exploit imbalances in these answers.

Most investors focus on:

  • Price charts
  • Influencers
  • Narratives
  • Social media hype

But rug pull architects focus on token supply mechanics, because that’s where they extract value.

Before You Buy Another Token — Read This

Most rug pulls are visible in the tokenomics long before price collapses.
If you’re serious about protecting capital in crypto, this guide will change how you evaluate every project going forward.

Clap now so you can easily come back to this checklist later.

The biggest tokenomics red flags signaling a rug pull include concentrated token ownership, unlocked team allocations, manipulable liquidity pools, unlimited minting rights, unsustainable yield emissions, unclear utility, and governance controlled by insiders.

Now let’s break each one down — with real-world logic and investor psychology behind them:

Red Flag #1: Concentrated Token Ownership (Whale-Controlled Supply)

Why This Is the #1 Rug Pull Indicator

If a small number of wallets control a large percentage of supply, price is an illusion.

A common rug pull structure looks like this:

  • Public thinks supply is “decentralized”
  • Reality: top 5 wallets hold 40–80%
  • Liquidity is thin
  • One coordinated sell = collapse

Danger Thresholds to Watch

  • Top 10 wallets hold more than 50%
  • One wallet holds over 10–15%
  • Team wallets disguised as “community” wallets

How Rug Pulls Use This

Scammers:

  • Slowly hype the token
  • Encourage retail buying
  • Let price climb organically
  • Dump in phases to avoid instant detection

Retail sees:

“Healthy pullbacks”

Reality:

Controlled distribution unloading

How to Protect Yourself

  • Check token holder distribution on Etherscan / Solscan
  • Identify wallet labels
  • Look for vesting vs liquid balances

If whales can exit before you can react, it’s not investing — it’s a trap.

Red Flag #2: Team Tokens That Are Unlocked or Poorly Vested

Why Vesting Is Non-Negotiable

Legitimate projects align incentives over years, not weeks.

Rug pulls align incentives until liquidity is deep enough.

Common Scam Patterns

  • “Team tokens are locked” (but no proof)
  • Vesting schedules buried in docs
  • Tokens technically “locked” but unlockable by multisig
  • Cliff unlocks at 30–90 days

Typical Rug Timeline

  1. Token launches
  2. Marketing push begins
  3. Price appreciates
  4. Team tokens unlock
  5. Liquidity drains
  6. Social channels go silent

Best-Practice Vesting (Green Flags)

  • 12–24 month vesting
  • Transparent smart contracts
  • Public unlock dashboards
  • No early cliffs

If founders can exit before product-market fit, they will.

Red Flag #3: Liquidity That Can Be Removed or Manipulated

Liquidity Is the Exit Door

Liquidity determines:

  • How easily you can sell
  • How much price moves when you do

Rug pulls revolve around liquidity control.

Major Liquidity Red Flags

  • Liquidity not locked
  • Liquidity locked for <6 months
  • Liquidity controlled by deployer wallet
  • Multiple liquidity pools with uneven depth

Classic Liquidity Rug

  1. Project launches on DEX
  2. Liquidity attracts buyers
  3. Price rises
  4. Liquidity is removed
  5. Token becomes unsellable

Price may still display — but there’s no exit.

How to Check

  • Verify LP tokens are burned or time-locked
  • Check locker contracts (Team Finance, Unicrypt)
  • Confirm who controls LP ownership

No locked liquidity = no real market.

Red Flag #4: Unlimited Minting or Hidden Supply Expansion

The Silent Killer of Token Value

If supply can be increased at will, your ownership is temporary.

Many rug pulls don’t crash price immediately — they inflate supply until price dies slowly.

Dangerous Contract Clauses

  • Owner-only mint functions
  • “Upgradeable” token contracts
  • Governance proposals controlled by insiders
  • Emergency mint permissions

Why This Works on Retail

Retail focuses on:

  • Market cap
  • Token price

Scammers focus on:

  • Future supply control

By the time inflation hits:

  • Liquidity is gone
  • Interest is gone
  • Community is fragmented

Safe Token Design

  • Fixed max supply
  • Immutable contracts
  • Minting disabled or burned
  • Transparent governance thresholds

If supply is elastic and centralized, so is risk.

Red Flag #5: Unsustainable Yield Emissions (Ponzinomics)

High APY Is Not Passive Income

If yields are paid only in newly printed tokens, value transfer is happening — from late buyers to early sellers.

Common Ponzinomics Signals

  • Triple or quadruple-digit APYs
  • Rewards disconnected from revenue
  • Emissions with no demand sink
  • “Temporary” high yields that never end

How Rug Pulls Use Yield

  • Inflate TVL
  • Attract mercenary capital
  • Create artificial legitimacy
  • Dump rewards into liquidity

Key Question to Ask

Where does yield come from?

Healthy answers:

  • Trading fees
  • Real protocol revenue
  • External demand

Unhealthy answer:

  • “Token emissions”

If yield requires new buyers to sustain it, collapse is guaranteed.

High APY ≠ Passive Income

If yield comes from token emissions, someone is paying the price — and it’s usually late buyers.

Bookmark this article and use it as a pre-buy checklist before touching any new token.

One saved decision can protect years of gains.

Red Flag #6: No Clear Token Utility Beyond Speculation

Tokens Need Demand Drivers

A token without real utility has only one buyer motivation: price appreciation.

That’s fragile.

Weak Utility Red Flags

  • “Governance” with no real power
  • Utility promised in the future
  • Token not required for core protocol actions
  • Value accrual unclear or nonexistent

Rug Pull Strategy Here

  • Promise future integrations
  • Delay real use cases
  • Let speculation drive price
  • Exit before utility is needed

Strong Utility Looks Like

  • Fees paid in token
  • Staking tied to revenue
  • Access control
  • Supply sinks (burns, locks)

Speculation fades. Utility compounds.

Red Flag #7: Governance Controlled by Insiders

Decentralization Theater

Many rug pulls advertise “DAO governance” while maintaining full control behind the scenes.

Governance Red Flags

  • Team controls majority of votes
  • Multisig controlled by insiders
  • Proposals pass instantly
  • No quorum requirements

Why This Matters

Governance can be used to:

  • Change token supply
  • Unlock liquidity
  • Redirect treasury funds
  • Modify emission schedules

All legally on-chain, but economically devastating.

Healthy Governance Signals

  • Distributed voting power
  • Time delays on execution
  • Transparent proposal history
  • Community veto mechanisms

If governance isn’t real, decentralization is marketing.

Why Smart Investors Lose to Tokenomics Traps

Even experienced investors fall for rug pulls because:

  • Bull markets reward speed over diligence
  • Social proof overrides analysis
  • Early profits create false confidence
  • Tokenomics feels “boring” until it matters

But the truth is simple:

Price tells you what happened.
Tokenomics tells you what will happen.

Tokenomics Rug Pull Checklist (Save This)

Before buying any token, ask:

  • Who controls supply?
  • Are team tokens vested?
  • Is liquidity locked?
  • Can supply increase?
  • Is yield sustainable?
  • Does the token have real utility?
  • Who controls governance?

If two or more answers are unclear, walk away.

Conclusion: Rug Pulls Are Designed, Not Accidental

Most rug pulls are not chaotic failures. They are financially engineered exits.

Tokenomics is the blueprint.

If you learn to read it, you stop chasing hype — and start preserving capital.

In crypto, survival is alpha.

If this article helped you:

  • Clap to help others avoid scams
  • Share it with someone new to crypto
  • Follow for deep-dive crypto risk analysis

Because in the next bull market, the biggest returns won’t come from buying faster — but from avoiding traps earlier.


7 Tokenomics Red Flags That Signal a Rug Pull was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Why Most Traders Misread Volume: A Deep Dive into Standard Volume vs Daily 24h Volume

21 January 2026 at 09:27

And how a more advanced approach changed the way I trade momentum, breakouts, and liquidity

Volume is one of the most widely used metrics in trading. Every crypto trader, from beginner to professional, has stared at the green and red bars under their chart trying to decode market intent.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth:

Most traders are reading the wrong volume.
Or worse — they’re reading it in the wrong context.

This is especially true when it comes to the popular Daily 24h Volume indicator. You’ve probably seen it on exchanges like Binance, Bybit, OKX — and on TradingView indicators that attempt to emulate it.

And while the metric sounds intuitive (“how much volume traded in the last 24h”), it’s often misunderstood and misapplied in live trading.

In this article, I want to break down:

  • Why many traders rely on Daily 24h Volume Indicator
  • What its conceptual weaknesses are
  • How it differs from standard bar-by-bar volume
  • A clear comparison between the two
  • And how these insights led me to build a customized, more actionable volume engine that I personally use

Let’s start with the basics.

1. Why Traders Use Daily 24h Volume Indicator

At the bottom, the 24-hour volume is highlighted in red, compared to the standard volume indicator above.

Daily 24h Volume Indicator is attractive because:

  • It reflects overall market participation
  • It updates continuously and shows exchange-wide liquidity
  • It gives a sense of the asset’s current “activity level”

For example:

  • If 24h volume is rising → traders assume interest is growing
  • If 24h volume is dropping → traders assume liquidity is drying up

It’s a macro-level liquidity gauge.

But here’s the problem:

Daily 24h volume does NOT tell you what’s happening right now on your candle. It tells you what happened in the past day, smoothed into one enormous rolling window. This introduces several pitfalls.

2. The Weaknesses of Daily 24h Volume (Why It Misleads Traders)

Weakness 1 — It’s a rolling metric, not a per-bar signal

Daily 24 volume cannot show momentum shifts inside a candle. You might think volume is increasing… But it’s actually just updating the rolling window.

Weakness 2 — It hides individual bar structure

It blends all buy/sell pressure, spikes, and micro-movements into one big number.

You miss:

  • Who is in control (buyers or sellers)
  • Strength of candle body
  • Wick dominance
  • Volume spikes on breakouts

Weakness 3 — It reacts slowly

Because it covers the full 24h window, it behaves like a moving average:

  • Big events fade slowly
  • Sudden surges barely move the line
  • It lags on market turns

Weakness 4 — Traders assume it reflects “current volume”

But the bar forming RIGHT NOW could have:

  • Huge actual volume
  • But Daily 24 barely moves

— or —

  • Very small actual volume
  • But Daily 24 stays high from past candles

This disconnect confuses decision-making.

3. Standard Volume vs Daily 24 Volume — Conceptual Differences

Below is a simplified comparison to set things straight.

In short:

  • Daily 24h volume is liquidity context.
  • Per-bar volume is actionable information.

Most traders mix these two concepts — and get confused signals as a result.

4. Why I Built My Own Volume Indicator

After years of active crypto trading, I realized I needed:

  • Something as reliable as per-candle volume
  • Something as informative as exchange 24h volume
  • Something that actually helps predict breakouts and momentum shifts
  • Something that reflects real buying/selling pressure, not just bar color
  • Something that filters noise and highlights meaningful spikes

This led me to develop the Advanced Volume Suite — a tool that merges the strengths of both worlds:

  • Exchange-style liquidity
  • Real-time actionable volume signals
  • Momentum detection
  • Spike identification
  • Breakout confirmation

It’s the volume engine I personally use in my trading, and now I’m sharing it publicly.

The next section describes how it works.

5. Introducing a complete professional toolkit for reading true market volume, momentum, and liquidity: Advanced Volume Suite (24h, Pulse, Spikes, Breakout Pressure)

🔍 What This Indicator Does

The Advanced Volume Suite is a multi-layered volume analysis system designed for traders who rely on volume as a primary decision driver. It expands far beyond TradingView’s standard volume bars by adding:

✔ True USDT Volume

All volume is converted into USDT value (volume × close) to normalize activity across increasing or decreasing prices.

✔ Rolling 24-Hour Volume (Exchange-style metric)

The indicator calculates a custom 24h rolling volume, just like Binance and Bybit display.

✔ Volume Pulse (Strength vs Average)

A powerful ratio that measures momentum inside each bar.

✔ Smart Volume Spike Detection

Identifies abnormal activity using:

  • Body strength
  • Wick compression
  • Trend alignment

✔ Breakout Pressure Engine

Detects:

  • Confirmed breakouts
  • Fakeouts
  • Areas where pressure is building near key levels

6. Fully customizable Advanced Volume Coloring — 3 modes

The indicator introduces intelligent volume bar coloring, which improves clarity and helps interpret orderflow visually:

1️⃣ Simple Mode

Green = close > open
Red = close < open
(Like standard volume but using USDT values)

2️⃣ Body Mode

Colors only when candle body is strong relative to its range.
Filters noise and highlights meaningful bars.

3️⃣ Delta-Style Mode

Detects “aggressive” buyers or sellers based on:

  • Candle body dominance
  • Upper/lower wick compression
  • Directional pressure

7. Why This Matters to Traders

This indicator bridges the gap between:

  • Micro-level volume (per-candle activity)
  • Macro-level liquidity (24h rolling volume)

And wraps it into:

  • A visual breakout system
  • A momentum pulse
  • Smart spike detection
  • Real candle-based volume coloring

It replaces multiple tools and simplifies your volume-based decision-making.

8. How It Differs From the Standard Volume Indicator

9. Final Thoughts

Volume is one of the most important trading metrics — but only when interpreted correctly.

  • Standard volume shows real-time behavior
  • Daily 24h volume shows high-level liquidity
  • My custom indicator merges both concepts and adds intelligent layers for clarity

If you’ve ever missed a breakout, failed to see a spike, or misjudged the strength behind a move, this suite gives you the clarity you were missing.

This indicator is fully free and open-source on TradingView, so that traders can review and verity its functionality.
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Why Most Traders Misread Volume: A Deep Dive into Standard Volume vs Daily 24h Volume was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Fixed Risk vs Fixed Quantity — why this kept bothering me

21 January 2026 at 09:27

Fixed Risk vs Fixed Quantity — why this kept bothering me

Fixed Risk vs Fixed Quantity — why this kept bothering me

I remember staring at my position size one evening and thinking, something feels off, but I can’t name it.

The trade itself wasn’t dramatic. No big loss. No big win. Just one of those regular trades that quietly adds up over time. But when I looked at my journal later, I noticed something uncomfortable.

Two trades. Same setup quality. Same confidence. Very different emotional reactions.

That’s when the confusion really started for me — fixed risk versus fixed quantity.
Not as concepts. I already “knew” them.
But as lived decisions.

Where the confusion actually comes from

Most of us hear about these ideas early on. Fixed quantity sounds simple: buy the same number of shares or lots every time. Fixed risk sounds more mature: risk the same amount of money per trade.

On paper, both feel reasonable.

And that’s part of the problem. Nothing obviously screams wrong.

But trading doesn’t punish what’s obviously wrong.
It punishes what’s subtly inconsistent.

I didn’t realize this at first. I thought my confusion was technical. It wasn’t. It was emotional.

What fixed quantity feels like when you’re inside it

When I traded fixed quantity, everything looked clean. Same lot size. Same number. No extra math.

But the risk was never the same.

Some trades barely moved against me. Others went straight to the stop and felt heavy. Not because the loss was huge — but because I didn’t expect it to feel that way.

I started reacting differently to identical outcomes.

A loss on a tight stop felt “acceptable.”
A loss on a wider stop felt unfair — even though I chose both.

That inconsistency messed with my head more than I expected.

Fixed risk sounds smarter… until you try living with it

When I switched to fixed risk, I felt grown up. Disciplined. Responsible.

Same money risked every trade. No exceptions.

But then another thing happened.
My position sizes changed constantly.

Some traders felt tiny. Almost pointless.
Others felt uncomfortably large.

Again, nothing was technically wrong. But emotionally, I kept second-guessing myself.

I’d look at a trade and think, why does this one feel scarier?
Same risk. Different exposure.

It took me longer than I’d like to admit realizing that fear doesn’t respond to math. It responds to perception.

What most people argue about — and why it misses the point

I’ve seen endless debates online.

“Fixed risk is the only professional way.”
“Fixed quantity is simpler and more consistent.”
“Just do what institutions do.”

None of that helped me.

Because the real issue wasn’t which method was correct.
It was whether the method matched how my brain processes uncertainty.

No one talks enough about that.

The part nobody warned me about

Here’s something I learned the slow way.

Your risk model shapes your behavior more than your strategy ever will.

With fixed quantity, I became lazy about stop placement.
With fixed risk, I became obsessed with position size.

Both distracted me — from the actual quality of the trade.

And worse, they influenced how long I stayed in losing trades, how quickly I booked winners, and how much confidence I carried into the next setup.

Same chart. Different mindset.

When my thinking finally started to shift

The change didn’t come from reading another thread or watching another video.

It came from journaling a streak of boring trades.

Not the big wins. Not the disasters.
The normal ones.

I noticed something simple:
I traded best when I stopped thinking about money during the trade.

Not before. During.

The moment I entered, the less aware I was of position size or loss amount, the calmer I was. The clearer my decisions became.

That’s when the question stopped being “fixed risk or fixed quantity?”

It became: Which approach lets me forget about money once I’m in the trade?

What actually matters more than the method

Risk consistency matters.
But emotional consistency matters more.

If fixed quantity keeps you calm and present, it’s not “wrong.”
If fixed risk keeps you detached and steady, it’s not automatically better — it’s just better for you.

The danger isn’t choosing the wrong model.
The danger is choosing one because it sounds right, not because it feels stable over time.

I wish someone had told me that earlier.

Where I’ve landed, for now

I don’t think of this as a solved problem anymore.

Markets change.
My psychology changes.
Life changes.

What works for me now might quietly stop working later.

And that’s okay.

I’m less interested in being correct.
More interested in being consistent — emotionally, not mathematically.

Because in the end, the account doesn’t blow up from bad formulas.
It blows up from tiny, repeated moments of internal conflict.

That’s the part I pay attention to now.

This piece is part of Quiet Trading Notes, where ideas are explored clearly — without hype, shortcuts, or promises.


Fixed Risk vs Fixed Quantity — why this kept bothering me was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Trader Strategies That Work (and Fail) on Hyperliquid

By: MintonFin
21 January 2026 at 06:10
Trader Strategies That Work (and Fail) on Hyperliquid

Hyperliquid doesn’t punish bad traders — it exposes them. And in 2026’s ultra-competitive on-chain trading landscape, exposure happens faster than ever.

As one of the fastest-growing decentralized perpetual exchanges, Hyperliquid has become a magnet for professional traders, whales, and high-frequency participants looking for deep liquidity without centralized risk. But while the platform itself is powerful, most traders still lose money on it — not because Hyperliquid is flawed, but because their strategies are.

This article breaks down which trading strategies actually work on Hyperliquid, which ones consistently fail, and why.

If you trade perpetuals, plan to, or are migrating from Binance, Bybit, or dYdX, this guide will help you avoid the most expensive mistakes traders keep repeating.

What Is Hyperliquid Trading?

Hyperliquid trading refers to spot and perpetual futures trading on Hyperliquid, a decentralized exchange with a fully on-chain order book, low latency execution, and transparent liquidation mechanics.

Traders use Hyperliquid to trade crypto perpetuals with leverage while retaining self-custody and avoiding centralized exchange risk.

Strategies That Work vs Strategies That Fail on Hyperliquid

Strategies that work on Hyperliquid:

  • Low leverage (1x–5x)
  • Defined invalidation levels
  • Funding-aware positioning
  • Trading high-liquidity pairs

Strategies that fail on Hyperliquid:

  • 20x–50x leverage
  • Revenge trading
  • Blind copy-trading
  • Scalping illiquid pairs

What Makes Hyperliquid Different From Other Perpetual Exchanges?

Before discussing strategies, it’s critical to understand why strategies behave differently on Hyperliquid compared to centralized exchanges.

Key Features That Change Strategy Performance

Hyperliquid is not just “another perp DEX.” Its architecture directly impacts trading outcomes:

  • Fully on-chain order book
  • No KYC
  • Low latency execution
  • Deep liquidity for major pairs
  • Transparent liquidation mechanics
  • No hidden exchange risk

This combination attracts professional traders, which means edge disappears faster and poor strategies are punished more efficiently.

Why Do Most Traders Lose Money on Hyperliquid?

Most traders lose money on Hyperliquid because they overuse leverage, ignore funding rates, overtrade low-liquidity pairs, and abandon risk management after losses.

Hyperliquid’s transparency exposes poor discipline faster than centralized exchanges.

If you’ve ever been liquidated and thought “I’ll make it back on the next trade”… you’re not alone, and that mindset is exactly why Hyperliquid wipes accounts fast.

Comment “DISCIPLINE” if this hit close to home, and clap so other traders see this before learning the hard way.

Which Trading Strategies Work Best on Hyperliquid?

The trading strategies that work best on Hyperliquid include:

  1. Low-leverage trend following
  2. Funding-aware position trading
  3. Range trading on high-liquidity pairs
  4. Risk-first position sizing
  5. Session-based trading discipline

Strategy #1 That Works: Low-Leverage Trend Following

Why Trend Following Thrives on Hyperliquid

Trend following remains one of the most consistently profitable strategies on Hyperliquid — when executed properly.

Because Hyperliquid’s order book reflects real, on-chain demand, strong directional moves tend to be cleaner and less manipulated than on smaller DEXs.

What works:

  • 2x–5x leverage
  • Clear higher-timeframe bias (4H / Daily)
  • Entries on pullbacks, not breakouts
  • Strict invalidation levels

Why it works:

  • Funding rates stay reasonable longer
  • Liquidity absorbs entries smoothly
  • Fewer artificial wicks than low-liquidity venues

Strategy #2 That Fails: High-Leverage Scalping

The Illusion of Easy Money

Many traders arrive on Hyperliquid thinking it’s a scalper’s paradise. Tight spreads, fast execution, no KYC — what could go wrong? Everything.

High-leverage scalping (20x–50x) consistently underperforms on Hyperliquid for most retail traders.

Why it fails:

  • On-chain execution still has latency
  • Professional traders dominate short-term order flow
  • Fees + slippage compound faster than expected
  • One liquidation erases dozens of small wins

Hyperliquid is efficient, not forgiving.

Strategy #3 That Works: Funding-Aware Position Trading

Trading Funding Instead of Price

One of the most overlooked advantages on Hyperliquid is funding transparency.

Unlike centralized exchanges where funding can feel opaque or manipulated, Hyperliquid’s funding dynamics reflect real positioning imbalance.

Profitable approach:

  • Identify extreme positive or negative funding
  • Enter in the direction opposite crowded positioning
  • Use spot-like leverage (1x–3x)
  • Hold through mean reversion

Example:

When longs are paying excessive funding:

  • Reduce long exposure
  • Look for short entries near resistance
  • Target funding normalization rather than full trend reversal

This strategy rewards patience and capital efficiency, not reflexive trading.

Strategy #4 That Fails: Copying Whale Wallets Blindly

Transparency Cuts Both Ways

Yes, Hyperliquid is on-chain.
Yes, you can see whale activity.
No, that does not mean copying them will make you profitable.

Why copy-trading fails:

  • You don’t know their hedge structure
  • Their entry timing differs from yours
  • Their liquidation tolerance is larger
  • They may be market-making, not directional

By the time retail traders react, the edge is already gone.

Better alternative:
Use whale activity as context, not signals.

Strategy #5 That Works: Range Trading High-Liquidity Pairs

When Markets Go Sideways

Not every market trends — and Hyperliquid’s liquidity makes range trading viable when volatility compresses.

Best conditions:

  • BTC, ETH, SOL pairs
  • Clearly defined support/resistance
  • Flat funding rates
  • Low news volatility

Execution rules:

  • Enter near range extremes
  • Tight invalidation
  • Partial profits at midpoint
  • Never range-trade during macro events

Range trading rewards precision, not prediction.

Strategy #6 That Fails: Overtrading Low-Liquidity Pairs

Just Because It’s Listed Doesn’t Mean It’s Tradable

Hyperliquid supports a wide variety of assets — but liquidity quality varies dramatically.

Common failure patterns:

  • Slippage exceeds risk model
  • Stop losses trigger prematurely
  • Spreads widen during volatility
  • Liquidity disappears during stress

Professional traders stick to high-volume pairs for a reason.

Strategy #7 That Works: Risk-First Position Sizing

The Strategy Behind Every Winning Strategy

No strategy survives poor risk management.

The traders who last on Hyperliquid:

  • Risk 0.5%–1% per trade
  • Size positions after defining invalidation
  • Accept small losses quickly
  • Avoid revenge trading

Successful Hyperliquid traders prioritize position sizing and liquidation avoidance over leverage maximization.

Strategy #8 That Fails: Emotional Trading After Liquidations

The Fastest Way to Zero

Hyperliquid’s liquidation engine is transparent — but brutal.

The worst traders:

  • Increase leverage after losses
  • Trade immediately after liquidation
  • Abandon system rules
  • Chase “one trade to make it back”

This is not a strategy. It’s self-destruction with a chart.

Know someone trading Hyperliquid like it’s a casino?

Share this article with them before leverage teaches the lesson instead. One share can save a blown account.

Strategy #9 That Works: Session-Based Trading Discipline

Trade When Liquidity Is Real

Liquidity on Hyperliquid peaks during:

  • US market hours
  • Major macro overlaps
  • High-volume crypto sessions

Avoid trading during:

  • Thin overnight hours
  • Weekends with low volume
  • Illiquid holiday periods

Time selection alone can dramatically improve results.

Strategy #10 That Fails: Treating Hyperliquid Like a Casino

Hyperliquid is not:

  • A meme pump venue
  • A leverage toy
  • A replacement for risk discipline

It is a professional-grade trading venue that rewards preparation and punishes ego.

Difference Between Winning Traders and Losing Traders on Hyperliquid

The final difference isn’t strategy — it’s mindset.

Losing traders focus on:

  • Leverage
  • Win rate
  • PnL screenshots

Winning traders focus on:

  • Process
  • Drawdown control
  • Longevity

Hyperliquid magnifies both skill and weakness.

Conclusion: Hyperliquid Is a Mirror

Hyperliquid doesn’t create bad traders — it reveals them.

If your strategy relies on:

  • Overleverage
  • Speed without edge
  • Emotion over rules

It will fail.

If your strategy emphasizes:

  • Risk management
  • Patience
  • Structural understanding

It will scale.

The difference isn’t the platform. It’s the trader.

If this guide helped you:

  • Clap to support high-signal crypto education
  • Share it with traders migrating from CEXs
  • Follow for deeper breakdowns of on-chain trading, DeFi risk, and professional-grade crypto strategies

Trader Strategies That Work (and Fail) on Hyperliquid was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Consistency Is Not Discipline — It’s Identity

21 January 2026 at 06:10

Consistency Is Not Discipline — It’s Identity

“You should never move your stop loss.”

This is one of the most famous statements any trader will come across in their career, whether a newbie or an experienced trader.

My setup was solid. I was calm, composed (at least I thought I was), and knew what was expected of me. Executed my entry to perfection. I even took a screenshot to brag to my future self about how “perfect trades” get executed.

Little did I know, my trade had just begun. The price oscillated for hours around my breakeven level. I could feel the heaviness building up in my jaw with every price point move against my position.

There was no major news this day, so the price inched lower and lower, slowly heading towards my stop loss. “This is not fair. Why me?” I remember asking. “But hey… I am an experienced trader. I can beat the market. If only I could move my stop — and let this trade breathe a little. Only this once!

Once became twice, then three times, and then four times. By the time I snapped out of it, I was negative 30% down on my account balance. That’s when I realized that I just met the Guy who trades my account.

Why that story matters

That story isn’t about mistakes. It’s about identity exposure. Every trader has moments where the market removes excuses and leaves only one question:

“Who are you when execution actually costs something?”

Week 7 is about answering that honestly. Not with discipline. With identity.

The lie traders believe about consistency

Most traders believe consistency comes from:

  • More discipline
  • More motivation
  • More effort

That belief keeps them trapped. Because discipline is conditional.
Identity is not.

You don’t become consistent by trying harder. You become consistent when inconsistency becomes psychologically expensive. Until then, discipline will always fail on schedule.

Why discipline always breaks (and always will)

Discipline depends on variables the market is designed to attack:

  • Mood
  • Energy
  • Confidence
  • Recent results

When any of these shift, discipline collapses.

That’s why traders can look “disciplined” for:

  • A good week
  • A winning streak
  • A funded challenge phase

…and then implode.

Not because they’re lazy. Because discipline was never the controlling force. Identity was.

The identity gap that ruins traders

Here’s the uncomfortable truth:

Most traders act like traders, but identify as gamblers trying to improve.

So under pressure:

  • Gamblers seek relief
  • Traders seek execution

Your actions will always obey your identity — not your goals.

If you still need:

  • A win to feel “back on track”
  • Confirmation to feel confident
  • Market approval to stay calm
You already know which identity is in control.

How professionals actually think about consistency

Pro traders don’t ask:

“How do I stay disciplined here?”

They ask:

“What does someone like me do in this situation?”

That question removes:

  • Debate
  • Emotional negotiation
  • On-the-spot rationalization

Consistency stops being forced. It becomes self-aligned behavior. This is not mindset. It’s identity enforcement.

The three identity anchors of consistent traders

These are not traits. They are standards with consequences.

1. Outcome detachment

Consistent traders do not need this trade to work.

They measure success by:

  • Rule adherence
  • Quality of execution
  • Emotional neutrality

If your self-worth moves with P&L, consistency is impossible.

Pro traders understand this rule clearly:

A profitable trade with broken rules is logged as a loss.

If rules are violated:

  • Size is reduced
  • Or trading stops

No exceptions. No emotional accounting.

2. Process loyalty

Inconsistency begins the moment you say “just this once.” Pro traders do not violate rules to win.

They understand something amateurs don’t:

Rule violation is the real loss.

Winning while breaking rules trains the wrong identity. So they enforce this standard:

  • Rules are followed even when uncomfortable
  • Especially when uncomfortable

If you can’t follow your process on bad days, you don’t own a process — it owns you.

3. Self-trust

Consistency is impossible without self-trust.

And self-trust is not confidence.
It is evidence accumulated over time.

It’s built by:

  • Keeping promises to yourself
  • Executing without emotional justification
  • Stopping after mistakes instead of chasing recovery

No evidence = no trust. No matter how good today feels.

Why most traders sabotage consistency

Because consistency is boring.

No adrenaline.
No hero moments.
No dramatic recoveries.

Just:

  • Repetition
  • Restraint
  • Silence

Most traders don’t fail from a lack of skill. They fail because their ego needs stimulation. Boredom is the price of staying in the game. Most traders won’t pay it.

Consistency as a competitive advantage

Markets are noisy.
Participants are emotional.
Information is abundant.

Consistency is rare. And rarity creates edge. Not because it’s complex, but because it’s uncomfortable to maintain. If you can do what others won’t sustain, you don’t need to outsmart them.

You just outlast them.

Where this fits in the Roadmap

  • Weeks 1–2: Awareness & mindset
  • Weeks 3–4: Structure & analysis
  • Weeks 5–6: Execution under pressure
  • Week 7: Identity

This is where the roadmap stops being theory and starts becoming behavior. If identity doesn’t change here, nothing downstream holds.

Final standard (read this carefully)

You don’t become consistent by forcing discipline.

You ONLY become consistent when:

  • Your identity demands it
  • Your standards enforce it
  • Your behavior aligns without debate

Consistency is not something you do. It’s who you are when no one is watching.

And if your behavior changes when no one is watching, your identity hasn’t changed.


Consistency Is Not Discipline — It’s Identity was originally published in Coinmonks on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

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