Stock Market Split
Author: Prathik Desai
Compiled by: Block unicorn
Introduction
The clock is not a good remedy for covering delays. For decades, financial markets have been built around the speed of information transmission. They introduced closing bells, batch settlements, and regional exchanges, which made sense in an era of slow information flow. But all of that has changed. Capital will not wait. Just as water will always find a crack, so will capital. Financial gravity will pull it toward the fastest path to price information. This is the law of the market. Market participants will not tolerate inefficiency forever.
This is what I have observed from a macro perspective regarding the development of financial markets over the past few weeks.
In today’s article, I will help you understand what has broken the old bundled structure of financial markets, transforming it into a more efficient, unbundled structure that spans different venues, packaging, and time.
Job Change
I have been studying finance for over a decade. In the early stages of my learning, I regarded traditional stock exchanges as synonymous with the market. For most of their development, stock exchanges have been the gathering place for everyone and everything: buyers, sellers, regulators, and the technology that drives the market. They have indices that track component stocks and clocks that indicate trading times, telling everyone when they can trade and when they cannot.
But this has changed over the past few years. In fact, just in the past few weeks, we have seen several developments confirming this shift.
On March 18, S&P Dow Jones Indices licensed the S&P 500 Index to Trade[XYZ], allowing HIP-3 market deployers to launch the first and only perpetual derivatives contract based on the S&P 500 Index on the Hyperliquid exchange. The S&P 500 Index is the most closely watched large-cap index in the U.S., tracking 500 leading companies and covering about 80% of the total U.S. market capitalization, which exceeds $61 trillion. This index covers at least half of the global stock market capitalization.
This is an index that has been around for nearly 70 years, yet it is listed on a market that has only been established for 6 months.
The day after S&P announced this news, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved Nasdaq's application to trade and settle certain stocks in token form. Nasdaq is one of the most active trading venues globally, with nominal trading volumes often exceeding those of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), which is the largest exchange by market capitalization.
On March 16, Cboe Global Markets submitted a proposal to the SEC to launch "near 24x5 U.S. stock trading." The largest operating entity behind this U.S. financial exchange stated that it is prepared to offer around-the-clock stock trading services as early as December 2026.
But why is this happening? There is an increasing demand for extended trading hours for U.S. stocks.
These three initiatives collectively target the outdated bundled trading structure. The S&P 500 futures trading market launched by Hyperliquid challenges the convention that investors could only trade traditional indices through traditional markets for decades. It also makes it possible to trade one of the most tracked large-cap indices globally 24/7.
Nasdaq's tokenized stock trading initiative addresses infrastructure. It introduces a new form of packaging that allows the same stock to be traded in different ways. Previous attempts at tokenized stocks had faced criticism from the industry.
Investors questioned whether these tokens enjoyed the same rights as the original shares.
However, if I provide the same equity exposure through a token on the blockchain while retaining the voting rights and legal protections associated with the original dematerialized shares, wouldn’t you accept that?
Why would you do this? What’s in it for you?
So, what if you are an investor outside the U.S. looking for easier access to the stock market of the world’s largest economy? What if this tokenized stock made it easier for you to integrate it with collateral and lending systems?
When you consider around-the-clock trading, these advantages multiply.
This is what Cboe is criticizing. Its near around-the-clock (5 days a week, 24 hours a day) trading proposal aims to acknowledge that capital will not wait for office hours. Traders always want to express their views immediately after receiving information. If Cboe does not provide them with a market to express their views, traders will turn to other platforms that offer such markets.
What I am saying is not hypothetical or something that "might happen in the near future." It is happening right now as we speak.
A Split Future
In the HIP-3 market of Hyperliquid, the adoption of financial product splitting is most evident, with the market officially launching in late October 2025.
In just the past month, the cumulative trading volume of the HIP-3 market has increased by $72 billion. The cumulative trading volume for the previous four months was $78 billion.
In March, Trade[XYZ]’s perpetual market on traditional financial products and stocks accounted for 90% of HIP-3's daily trading volume. But that’s not the most interesting aspect.
More than half of Trade[XYZ]’s trading volume comes from the perpetual contract markets for silver, crude oil, Brent crude oil, and gold.
Hyperliquid provides a unified trading platform for trading spot cryptocurrencies as well as perpetual contracts for cryptocurrencies and traditional assets. This not only simplifies the trading process on a unified platform but also brings higher liquidity, a unified user interface, and smaller bid-ask spreads.
Traders still want to trade some of the largest and hottest assets, covering commodities, publicly listed companies, large private companies, and indices. You might want to trade silver, gold, crude oil, Tesla, Apple, Amazon, Google, indices tracking the top 100 non-financial companies in the U.S., and the S&P 500 Index—all of which can be done on the Hyperliquid platform.
HIP-3 separates the functionality of investing in these assets from the existing exchange infrastructure while still tracking the underlying assets of its original benchmarks. Therefore, when you go long on silver futures contracts on HIP-3, the underlying asset it tracks is still linked to the value of one ounce of silver in the Pyth data source.
The reason traders are choosing to trade silver on HIP-3 instead of previous platforms is that HIP-3 does not differentiate between U.S. and non-U.S. traders and does not follow any specific time. Whenever an event occurs where traders want to express their views through asset pricing, HIP-3 provides them with a market, unrestricted by the traders' geographical location or time zone.
In the past few weeks, the open interest (OI) on the Hyperliquid platform has grown significantly, reflecting the results mentioned above. OI measures the total value of open derivative positions. Unlike trading volume, which reflects trading activity, OI reflects trading commitments.
On March 1, the open interest was $1.13 billion, which doubled to $2.2 billion by April 1. This indicates that traders are confident in Hyperliquid's perpetual contracts and are locking in their funds.
These indicators suggest that when market access is more convenient and friction is reduced, traders will not be loyal to any particular platform or asset class. They will choose any platform that can provide volatility, convenience, and liquidity.
This is why traditional institutions like S&P, Nasdaq, and Cboe are taking steps to acknowledge this behavior.
At least two recent events have demonstrated the importance of around-the-clock trading and market volatility to traders.
Saurabh wrote in a tweet from Decentralised.Co: "On February 28, the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran during traditional market hours. Within hours, the price of oil-linked perpetual contracts on the Hyperliquid platform surged by 5% as traders digested the shock in real-time."
Just two weeks after the outbreak of war, the trading volume of oil-linked perpetual contracts surged from $200 million to a cumulative $6 billion.
One major risk for emerging platforms is liquidity. If liquidity is insufficient, bid-ask spreads may widen, leading to a pricing disadvantage for traders compared to other platforms.
The week before last, as U.S. President Trump was negotiating for "productive talks" with Iranian officials, the Hyperliquid platform demonstrated its strong liquidity. The newly launched S&P 500 futures based on the HIP-3 platform was able to accurately track the movements of the CME E-mini S&P 500 futures, down to the minute.
Although the on-chain perpetual contracts were about 50-70 points lower than ES, the price movements were quite similar.
What This Means
For decades, traditional markets have been bundled together, controlling venues (exchanges), time (trading hours), and products (indices/contracts).
They have chosen to maintain the status quo because they have failed to establish mechanisms to address inefficiencies such as time delays, trading hour restrictions, and regulatory limitations for non-U.S. investors. Instead, they have covered up these inefficiencies and packaged them into procedural systems designed to create a trustworthy institution to attract investors.
People will still trade and invest. This is not because they are foolish or gullible to the various claims made by traditional financial markets. They do so because they have no other choice. This situation began to change with the advent of blockchain, which provided the world with on-chain markets, making trading and investing unprecedentedly convenient.
People see this choice and seize it.
They did not care in the past and will not care in the future about changes in market structure. Whether the new structure is bundled or unbundled does not concern them. As long as traders and investors can express their opinions more conveniently through financial instruments, they will accept the new market structure. Whether this structure comes from traditional giants like Nasdaq, Cboe, or the S&P 500, or from permissionless platforms running on blockchain, is irrelevant.
The financial industry continues to evolve and will adopt any structure that can narrow the gap between the occurrence of events and the expression of price opinions.
Important events are happening all over the world every moment. So why should prices wait until the clock in a glass curtain building in New York starts ticking on Monday morning to be determined?
You may also like

Michael Saylor: Winter is Over – Is He Right? 5 Key Data Points (2026)
Michael Saylor tweeted yesterday “Winter‘s Over.” It is short. It is bold. And it has the crypto world talking.
But is he right? Or is this just another CEO pumping his bags?
Let us look at the data. Let us be neutral. Let us see if the ice has really melted.

WEEX Bubbles App Now Live Visualizes the Crypto Market at a Glance
WEEX Bubbles is a standalone app designed to help users quickly understand complex crypto market movements through an intuitive bubble visualization.

Polygon co-founder Sandeep: Writing after the chain bridge chain explosion

Major Upgrade on Web: 10+ Advanced Chart Styles for Deeper Market Insights
To deliver more powerful and professional analysis tools, WEEX has rolled out a major upgrade to its web trading charts—now supporting up to 14 advanced chart styles.

Morning Report | Aethir secures a $260 million enterprise contract with Axe Compute; New Fire Technology acquires Avenir Group's trading team; Polymarket's trading volume surpassed by Kalshi

Why a Million-Follower Crypto KOL Chooses WEEX VIP?
Discover why top crypto KOL Carl Moon partnered with WEEX. Explore the WEEX VIP ecosystem, 1,000 BTC protection fund, and exclusive rewards for serious traders.

CoinEx Founder: The Crypto Endgame in My Eyes

Spark Coin (SPK): Explodes 73% as Aave Bleeds $15B, A Good Investment Now?
Spark coin (SPK) surged 73% as $15 billion fled Aave after the KelpDAO hack. This article explains what Spark is, why it’s pumping, and whether it is a good investment right now.

As Aave's building collapses, Spark's high-rise is rising

RootData: Q1 2026 Cryptocurrency Exchange Transparency Research Report

What Is Memecoin Trading? A Beginner's Guide to How It Works, the Risks, and 2026's Hottest Tokens
Memecoins surged 30%+ at the start of 2026 while Bitcoin was flat. RAVE spiked 4,500% then crashed 90% in days. MAGA jumped 350% overnight. This guide explains exactly how memecoin trading works — and how to not blow up your account doing it.

Trump Extends Ceasefire: Bitcoin Hits $79K — What Crypto Traders Need to Know Right Now
Bitcoin surged past $79,000 after Trump extended the ceasefire indefinitely. We break down exactly what happened, how every major crypto reacted, and what traders should watch next — including the one level that could unlock an $85,000 BTC rally.

CHIP Crypto Price Prediction 2026: Can USD.AI's GPU Lending Token Reach $1?
CHIP's 24-hour trading volume hit $1.87 billion on a $236 million market cap — an 8x ratio that almost never happens on legitimate tokens. We explain what's driving it, what USD.AI actually does for GPU tokenization, and whether CHIP belongs in your AI crypto portfolio.

RootData: Q1 2026 Web3 Industry Investment Research Report

USDC is the only AI token

The voice of a senior Polymarket user: In fact, we have already been surpassed by our competitors

Transcript of Dr. Han, founder of Gate, speaking at the University of Hong Kong: Breaking the Matthew Effect and Winning in Asymmetric Competition

Who will replace AAVE as the new king?
Michael Saylor: Winter is Over – Is He Right? 5 Key Data Points (2026)
Michael Saylor tweeted yesterday “Winter‘s Over.” It is short. It is bold. And it has the crypto world talking.
But is he right? Or is this just another CEO pumping his bags?
Let us look at the data. Let us be neutral. Let us see if the ice has really melted.
WEEX Bubbles App Now Live Visualizes the Crypto Market at a Glance
WEEX Bubbles is a standalone app designed to help users quickly understand complex crypto market movements through an intuitive bubble visualization.
Polygon co-founder Sandeep: Writing after the chain bridge chain explosion
Major Upgrade on Web: 10+ Advanced Chart Styles for Deeper Market Insights
To deliver more powerful and professional analysis tools, WEEX has rolled out a major upgrade to its web trading charts—now supporting up to 14 advanced chart styles.
Morning Report | Aethir secures a $260 million enterprise contract with Axe Compute; New Fire Technology acquires Avenir Group's trading team; Polymarket's trading volume surpassed by Kalshi
Why a Million-Follower Crypto KOL Chooses WEEX VIP?
Discover why top crypto KOL Carl Moon partnered with WEEX. Explore the WEEX VIP ecosystem, 1,000 BTC protection fund, and exclusive rewards for serious traders.



