Hyperliquid’s HYPE token is facing a pivotal technical test as the platform’s top two traders have built more than $1 billion in combined short positions, including sizable bets against HYPE itself, while the project has provided new detail on how its trading engine, smart contracts, and builder-deployed markets are separated.
On-chain data from Hypurrscan as of 4:40 a.m. UTC on Nov. 2 showed the leaderboard’s top account held about $617.5 million in shorts across 22 assets, with equity near $131.2 million and leverage around 4.7x. The second account held $439.4 million in shorts across 30 assets on about $105.1 million equity. Both accounts are short HYPE: the leader’s roughly 48,837 HYPE position was worth $43.1 million and carried an unrealized loss of $8.34 million, while the second account’s HYPE short was even larger at $54.7 million. The leader’s largest position was an Ether short of about 97,460 ETH worth $224.5 million, opened near $2,322.72 with liquidation near $3,701. The account also shorted about $182.1 million in bitcoin, plus SOL, ZEC, XRP, gold, and silver.
Despite that positioning, HYPE traded near $85.81 on Monday, down about 2% over the previous day. The token remained above its 50-day moving average near $82.78 and well above the 200-day average near $68.95. The daily RSI sat near 55, leaving room before overbought territory, while MACD crossed above its signal line, suggesting upward momentum after a weekly gain of about 12% that cut the monthly loss to roughly 4%. Resistance sits near $88, with a break potentially targeting $95.25, while a rejection below $82.61 could open a slide toward $76.15.
The technical setup is reinforced by the platform’s architecture. HyperCore operates the built-in spot and perpetual futures order books, records orders, trades, and liquidations, and uses funding payments to keep perpetuals near underlying prices. HyperEVM runs Ethereum-style smart contracts, with $HYPE used for gas and, in eligible accounts, as collateral for borrowing. Hyperliquid activated CoreWriter on mainnet on July 21, 2025, allowing applications to read HyperCore data and send supported actions back to the trading system.
Under HIP-3, independent operators can deploy perpetual markets on HyperCore with their own contract rules, oracle prices, and margin caps. Deployers must stake 500,000 $HYPE, and validators can burn staked tokens for certain harmful actions. Builder codes are separate and let applications collect a user-approved fee on routed trades. Native crypto perpetuals use $USDC as margin, with portfolio margin allowing $HYPE and other supported assets to back borrowing under limits. Hyperliquid warned that linked contracts can contain arbitrary code, and for $USDC, Circle says HyperCore balances are protocol-level credits rather than Circle-issued tokens in the trading account.
Some institutional routes remain planned rather than live. On Oct. 26, 2026, Hyperliquid described HIP-3* as a testnet release with production support planned for a future upgrade. Payward’s proposed U.S. offering using that model was subject to regulatory approval, and ICE’s Oct. 29 announcement outlined a planned U.S.-regulated market and clearing structure with TradeXYZ, with access expected through regulated futures brokers pending approvals.
For HYPE, the next daily close near $88 resistance will likely decide whether whale shorts are squeezed or rewarded. A close above resistance could force covering and accelerate a move toward $95.25, while a failure at resistance and a close under $82.61 would shift control toward sellers and open a deeper decline toward $76.15.
