Before SpaceX Goes Public, Hyperliquid Is Running the Unofficial IPO

No matter how much someone might want to buy a stake in a private business preparing for an initial public offering (IPO), for most investors, it simply isn't possible. SpaceX, the rocket and satellite maker, is the platonic ideal of that frustration, as its pre-IPO valuation of roughly $1.8 trillion is a behemoth that ordinary investors have never been able to touch.

But before SpaceX prices its planned share offering in June, you should know that there's a way to get exposure to its stock in advance of the IPO, which is already available on Hyperliquid (CRYPTO: HYPE), a decentralized cryptocurrency exchange. It isn't the first time it's done something similar in advance of a hotly anticipated company going public.

Let's unpack what's going on here and then evaluate whether there are any opportunities worth investing in.

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This exchange is offering investors what they're clamoring for

Hyperliquid is a decentralized exchange (DEX) built specifically to handle perpetual futures contracts (also known as perps), which are financial derivatives that track an asset's price without ever expiring. In a nutshell, to trade a perp on its platform, all that's needed is to post some collateral with stablecoins and then take a position in the contract of your choice. No actual shares of the underlying asset ever change hands.

That last detail is the entire ballgame for understanding how Hyperliquid can serve as a way for investors to gain exposure to SpaceX before its IPO.

On May 18, a developer called Trade.xyz launched a SpaceX pre-IPO perpetual future contract on Hyperliquid at a $150 reference price despite holding none of the company's shares. Within hours, the price of one contract ran to $203, and Hype, the exchange's native token, jumped about 7% in a day.

So why did the price jump? In short, it's because Hyperliquid funnels about 99% of its trading fees into automated repurchases of HYPE tokens that it then removes from circulation. More trading activity, like when investors rush to buy pre-IPO exposure to SpaceX, means more fees, and more fees mean more buying pressure on a token whose supply keeps tightening.

For the record, Hyperliquid is currently generating so much in fees that its annualized revenue rate is near $656 million as of May 27. In 2025, it brought in $951 million in fees, which became $874 million in revenue.

The dress rehearsal went well

One bullish narrative for Hyperliquid says that these synthetic markets discover prices accurately, which is what makes them valuable.

One proof people cite as part of that argument is the recent debut of Cerebras Systems, the artificial intelligence (AI) chipmaker whose own pre-IPO perpetual future contract launched on the exchange on May 1. That contract opened at a $175 reference price, and Cerebras priced its IPO at $185 a few weeks later.

But the absolutely critical fact to understand here is that the perpetual futures contract never really priced Cerebras' shares. It was pricing secondary-market data from closed venues where pre-IPO shares are allowed to change hands, and once Cerebras actually opened for public trading, it soared to $350 and closed its first session at more than $311.

That pre- and post-IPO pricing gap is the whole lesson as it pertains to the SpaceX contract.

A pre-IPO perpetual future can tell you roughly where insiders are marking the value of a private company. It cannot tell you how a frenzied first day of public trading will reprice it. Nor does holding the contract enable anyone to convert their contracts into shares at any point in time. So holding the synthetic SpaceX contract means betting on a derivative with no ownership rights, anchored to data that may bear little resemblance to opening day reality; it isn't a good investment.

On the other hand, there's Hyperliquid, the asset positioned to capture fees across the entire wave of new megalistings. Even if the contracts on its platform aren't the right investments for most investors, there's still a lot of money to be made by offering them the option to take a chance, which is essentially the bull case for buying Hyperliquid.

Alex Carchidi has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Hyperliquid. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.