Liquidation Bloodbath, Perp DEX Wars and the Fuel of the Future

It’s been a tough week for crypto, as hopes of a green September were brutally liquidated. So, this week’s newsletter takes us through what caused the market to tank and what to look out for in the week ahead. Can we make it to Uptober alive?

Meanwhile, the only sector of the market to show any signs of life this week was perp DEXes, as the battle to dethrone Hyperliquid spilled out into the open. We examine why challengers are emerging to take a shot at the king, and whether Hyperliquid can hold on to its crown.

And, today’s video looks at a certain volatile metal that might turn out to be the most sought-after commodity of the century. Have your hazmat suits at the ready as we take a deep dive into the wonders of Uranium.

☢️ Today’s Video: Can Uranium Enrich Us? ☢️

Here’s a stat for those of you who like that sort of thing: it’s estimated that a single ChatGPT query uses ten times more electricity than a Google search. So, it stands to reason that, as AI becomes more and more a part of daily life, we’re going to need to start generating a lot more power.

Like it or not, the most efficient way to do so, without burning yet more fossil fuels, is to build more nuclear capacity. And nuclear power plants run on a metal created billions of years ago by exploding stars: Uranium. Logically therefore, more nuclear power means more demand for Uranium, which in turn means whoever produces it is going to be sitting pretty.

But, the process of extracting Uranium from the ground and getting it to the point at which it can be used as fuel is incredibly complex and controlled by only a handful of entities. Some countries dominate extraction, some companies dominate enrichment and, while demand keeps growing, supply is struggling to keep up.

In today’s video, we tell the fascinating story of Uranium and how it could become the most important commodity of the 21st Century. We look at who the big players are and why some countries have taken steps to control their supply chains, while others have let their grip on the industry slip. Could this be the investment opportunity of a lifetime?

You can watch that video here.

📈 Crypto Market Forecast 📈

It’s now been four weeks since September started, and the crypto market looks like it’s on track to close the month in the red in typical Rektember fashion. Although Bitcoin is still technically in the green on the month, it doesn’t look like this is going to last for long, and Ethereum is massively in the red on the month. Thankfully, Uptober is just around the corner.

But it’s worth quickly recapping why last week was so brutal. In case you missed the memo, last week we saw crypto’s largest long liquidations of 2025, with two to three days of $1B+ in longs being liquidated over a five-day period. While the second wave of long liquidations was due to stronger-than-expected economic data, the first wave is still unexplained, and had no clear catalyst.

According to research by macro analyst Andreas Steno-Larsen, the first wave of long liquidations which took place on late Sunday/early Monday occurred during a window where crypto liquidity tends to be very low. Logically, this has led to speculation that the long liquidations could have been caused by market manipulation during this low liquidity period.

Further circumstantial evidence for this can be seen in the fact that stocks and precious metals were rising while crypto was crashing. This basically tells us that the reason for the crypto crash was specific to crypto, because if it was related to macro, stocks and precious metals would have fallen as well. But again, there was no clear catalyst for the first wave of long liquidations.

This begs the question of what the next week holds in store for crypto and stocks. The answer depends on who you ask. According to macro analyst Cem Karsan, the week after Q3 options expiry tends to be weak, but markets tend to rebound in the weeks after that. For context, Q3 options expiry was on September 19th. This could have contributed to last week’s weakness.

In case you’re wondering, Cem expects the markets to continue melting up after the Q3 opex slump is over, specifically in October and November. Similarly, many traders and portfolio managers such as Lance Roberts have highlighted the fact that institutions are still offside, and are likely to take advantage of the recent pullback to allocate to various assets to do well in Q4.

In addition to these structural factors, there will be multiple macro catalysts next week, the most important of which is the unemployment rate for September, which will be published on Friday. As most of you will know, a lower-than-expected unemployment rate would be bearish, while a higher-than-expected unemployment rate would be bullish due to the Fed’s approach to policy.

What you may not know is that there’s another macro factor which could move the markets this week, and that’s the possibility of a government shutdown. For reference, the US government could shut down starting Wednesday, with Trump reportedly preparing to instruct government agencies to start laying off employees in case a shutdown occurs.

Speaking of which, you might remember that Trump gave a buyout offer to federal employees back in January. This offer gave federal employees payments until September 30th. After this point, any federal employees who failed to find work will likely file for unemployment, foreshadowing a higher unemployment rate in the future.

But the most important thing to watch this week on the macro front will be how things like the US government shutdown and unemployment data affect the dollar. In case you forgot, DXY up typically means everything else down, especially risk assets like crypto. The rise in the DXY and fall in crypto after last week’s strong economic data is a recent example of this.

If the cocktail of macro data we get this week sends the DXY higher, don’t be surprised to see the crypto market grind lower. In a worst-case scenario, we could see the DXY spike higher like it did in October 2017. This would turn Uptober into Rektember part 2. It would also correspond to the rise in Bitcoin Dominance that many crypto analysts like Ben Cowen foresee for October.

In sum then, it’s likely to be another volatile week in the crypto market. With luck, there will be a bounce or even a relief rally, especially since crypto is very oversold (at least at the time of writing). Watch the DXY closely, and hope that it starts falling instead of rallying to the upside.

💧 Hyperliquid's Future 💧

HYPE’s Damocles Sword.

That was the title of an X article published by Arthur Hayes’ Maelstrom fund last week.

For those unfamiliar, the sword of Damocles is an expression used to refer to an impending disaster or imminent threat that constantly looms over those in positions of power. It comes from the legend of an ancient Syracusan courtier named Damocles who envied the power and luxury enjoyed by his ruler, King Dionysius II.

One day, in order to give Damocles a real taste of the life that comes with great fortune, the king invited him to a lavish banquet where Damocles sat on the throne. The banquet table had everything that Damocles could ever wish for. However, he was unable to enjoy the meal. You see, the king had dangled a sharp sword suspended by a single horsehair above the throne. It was meant to symbolise the hidden dangers that threatened to come crashing down at any moment on those with immense success or power.

Similarly, the Maelstrom article argues that Hyperliquid, the market leader in the perp DEX category, is finally beginning to face some real dangers that could stall the price momentum of its native coin and even dethrone the DEX from its position as market leader.

Specifically, the article speaks of two looming threats. The first is the impending supply unlock of Hyperliquid’s native HYPE coin. Starting November 29 2025, Hyperliquid will begin linearly releasing 237.8 million HYPE tokens over 24 months. At a hypothetical price of $50 per token, that’s a staggering $12 billion in potential sell pressure over the course of the next two years. That’s roughly $500 million worth of sells every single month. The article claims that, as things stand, current buyback mechanisms (98% of trading fees) might only absorb about 17% of it, leaving a $410 million monthly surplus that the market would need to digest.

The second threat is the rise of competitors looking to steal Hyperliquid’s core users during its moment of weakness. For instance, over the past week, we’ve seen the emergence of Aster – pushed by the endorsement of titans like Binance founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ). We’ve also seen other perp DEX projects like Avantis, Lighter, edgeX, Reya Network and Pacifica starting to gain attention and user interest.

In fact, Aster overtook Hyperliquid in daily perpetual futures trading volume for the first time last week. This amplified some of the concerns laid out in the Maelstrom article, with HYPE bleeding nearly 30% on the weekly.

So, should Hyperliquid fans and HYPE holders be concerned?

Well, the concerns around HYPE are valid. But, the future of Hyperliquid isn’t as bleak as most imagine it to be. In fact, we wouldn’t be surprised to see Hyperliquid continue to dominate at the top of the leaderboard even three years down the line.

A close look at the open interest (OI) and volume (Vol) data across all the different perp DEXes shows that Hyperliquid still leads by a wide margin over all other perp DEXes, barring Aster and Lighter. While both Aster and Lighter have managed to catch up to Hyperliquid in recent days, a look at their OI/Vol ratios shows that much of the trading volume on these exchanges likely comes from wash trading, unless HFT firms are power users of course. If you ask us, we’d lean towards wash trading, since both exchanges have ongoing points programs that users are farming in hopes of an airdrop.

On that note, Hyperliquid is the only one whose OI/Vol ratio is comparable to CEXes like Binance, OKX and Bybit. This points to much of the volume and open interest on Hyperliquid coming from organic activity. Not to mention, many of Hyperliquid's competitors are still in their early stages – despite what their tokens’ price action may suggest.

In contrast, Hyperliquid is well ahead of the crowd. Its inherent builder culture remains a core strength. There’s a lot of technical innovation inbound once (Hyperliquid Improvement Proposals) HIP-3 and HIP-4 are implemented. For instance, HIP-3 enables "builder-deployed perps," allowing anyone to permissionlessly list new perpetual markets on Hyperliquid. The vision is to supposedly make Hypercore (Hyperliquid’s matching engine) the "AWS of liquidity."

This shifts from curated listings to a fully decentralised process, empowering builders to create markets for any asset, including equities and RWAs. As for HIP-4, it addresses oracle limitations for event-based perps. To put it simply, it unlocks the technical capabilities needed to host prediction markets on Hyperliquid. At its core, these upgrades (among others to come) make Hyperliquid's tech arguably superior for high-frequency trading and new asset classes.

As for the impending sell pressure on HYPE, it’s important to note that a ‘down only’ outlook discounts rising demand for the token from sources external to existing revenue/buybacks. Most notably, the growing adoption of Hyperliquid’s EVM chain which uses HYPE as its native gas token. As stated earlier, HIP-3 and HIP-4 unlock new markets on Hyperliquid. These will likely drive more users to the ecosystem. A comparable example would be Solana’s rise from single-digit lows in the bear market to triple digit highs after a revival of the ‘Solana trenches.’

Not to mention, there’s also USDH, Hyperliquid's native stablecoin. Issued by Native Markets, USDH is backed by cash and US Treasuries. In addition to reducing Hyperliquid’s dependency on USDC (which currently powers 95% of Hyperliquid's activity) USDH captures revenue from the reserves backing the asset. Notably, fifty percent of these yields fund HYPE buybacks and ecosystem growth, further offsetting some of the unlock pressures.

Nevertheless, it's always a good idea to hedge your positions. But don’t become a perma bear just yet. Despite the elder china statesman’s efforts, the $800 per HL point prophecy lives on.

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🇪🇸 Coin Bureau Espanol Update! 🇪🇸

We are happy to announce that our Spanish Channel has taken a massive step and we are hiring an additional trading host.

Crypto Cedric is a well known trader who has won multiple exchange competitions. He will be joining Marbe & her team to produce actionable and educational trading videos weekly.

He has an intro video coming out in the next few hours so be sure to keep an on Coin Bureau Espanol to and turn those notifications on.

Bienvenido al equipo, Cedric. Estamos emocionados de aprender de ti.

🔮 Video Pipeline 🔮

* Top 5 Fee Revenue: The crypto projects generating the most revenue!
* Keep Crypto Safe: How to buy, store and protect your crypto?
* Longs & Short Liquidations: How leverage works and how it moves prices?
* Gold & Silver Miners: Why prices are surging & how mining stocks are reacting?
* Metamask Token: All you need to know about the MASK token!

🏆 What's New at CoinBureau.com This Week? 🏆

* Coinbase vs Robinhood (2025): Fees, Features, Safety & Which Is Best for You
* Top Solana DApps to Use in 2025: DeFi, NFTs, Perps, Payments
* A Step-by-Step Guide to Withdrawing Funds from Crypto.com in 2025
* Is Coinbase Wallet Secure In 2025?

📖 Quote of the Week 📖

Yes, we are all waiting for that altcoin season. But, it will come. The best alpha you have right now is in waiting and having that longer-term time frame.

"A man who is a master of patience is master of everything else." - George Savile

Team Coin Bureau

Disclosure: Authors may own cryptoassets named in this newsletter. These are unqualified opinions, and a Coin Bureau newsletter, is meant for informational purposes only. It is not meant to serve as investment advice. Please consult with your investment, tax, or legal advisor.