On-chain Options Trading Volume Soars, Will Deribit’s Position Be Shaken?

Derive dominates the market, while Paradex and Hypercall enter the fray.

Written by: Pink Brains
Compiled by: Luffy, Foresight News

In September 2026, the notional trading volume of on-chain options reached between $4.8 billion and $5.6 billion. Just a month prior, this figure was only $1.9 billion. The actual cash paid for contracts, known as premiums, increased by one-third to $85 million. Open interest also surged to nearly $2.5 billion by the end of September, before retreating to about $1.75 billion as of October 12, with over 90% of the open interest concentrated on a single platform.

Remember mid-2025 when Hyperliquid briefly held over 70% of the market share in the on-chain perpetual contract space? However, after the market cap of the HYPE token surpassed $15 billion, Aster and Lighter managed to compress its market share to below 40% in just four months. The on-chain options sector may soon face a similar scenario.

For most of this cycle, on-chain options were widely regarded as a necessary derivative, yet no project truly excelled in product development until Derive emerged. Currently, the daily trading volume of on-chain perpetual contracts is around $21 billion, and even in the months of record highs, the trading volume of on-chain options remains less than 1% of that of perpetual contracts.

This article will introduce the operational mechanisms of on-chain options, the reasons behind the trading volume explosion in 2026, leading options trading platforms, existing shortcomings in the sector, and provide beginners with a few simple options trading strategies.

How On-chain Options Work

Options grant holders rights but not obligations to buy (call options) or sell (put options) an asset at an agreed price on a specified date. You need to pay a premium to obtain this right. The option seller collects this premium and assumes the obligation to fulfill the contract.

If you are the buyer, your maximum loss is limited to this premium. Even if the market drops by 20%, as long as your directional judgment is correct, you will not be liquidated. This is the core appeal of options compared to perpetual contracts.

On-chain options platforms can be divided into three categories:

• Order Book Exchanges. Market makers post buy and sell quotes. If your trade size is large or involves multi-leg trades (note: multi-leg trades refer to establishing two or more option positions on the same underlying asset simultaneously to form a composite strategy), you can initiate a request for quote (RFQ), where multiple market makers provide quotes simultaneously, allowing for a single transaction. Matching occurs off-chain to ensure speed, while funds, margins, and settlement logic remain on-chain. Derive, Paradex, Hypercall, and Aevo fall into this category.
• Vaults. You deposit an asset, choose a strike price above the current price, and then sell a corresponding call option. Market makers or protocol liquidity pools buy this option and hedge it. You receive the premium in USD immediately; upon expiration, you can either retain the asset or settle it at the strike price. Rysk employs this model, where users can only act as option sellers.
• Simple Applications. The interface only displays the direction of price movement and trade size, with the application automatically purchasing call or put options for users, hiding the strike price and expiration date. Dream is an example of such a product.

Where can you track on-chain options trading data?

We recommend the website: onchaingreeks.xyz. It focuses on three key metrics of the platform: notional trading volume (contract face value), premiums (actual cash turnover), and open interest (positions still active).

Another useful site is: opshnz.com. It was independently built by a Korean developer and is updated daily, making it easy for options newcomers to navigate. You can:

• View around 40 options projects in an overview, categorized by public chain, displaying real-time prices and marking projects that have not yet issued tokens.
• Filter based on needs: earning income, simple market betting, or professional trading.
• Obtain simple trading operation guides under CPI, FOMC, and liquidation scenarios, matching suitable trading platforms.
• Track incentive activities and newly launched projects each week.

Why Will Trading Volume Rise in 2026?

Moving options on-chain is not a new concept, but early solutions from 2021 to 2022 had many flaws and ultimately failed. AMM options liquidity pools forced liquidity providers to bear unhedgeable volatility risks; different strike prices and expiration dates formed independent markets with thin liquidity; every market fluctuation required market makers to re-quote hundreds of contracts, incurring gas fees with each quote; and there was no portfolio margin mechanism, meaning hedged positions occupied the same margin as naked positions.

Now, with technological iterations, many of these flaws are gradually being addressed.

Application chains and Rollup technology have made the off-chain matching + on-chain settlement order book model cost-effective and feasible.

• Professional market makers are entering the scene, with platforms providing incentives to retain quotes. FalconX has been quoting on Derive since October 2025; Derive's institutional trading incentive program subsidizes market makers to maintain continuous orders.
• Portfolio margining has been implemented, allowing call options, short perpetual contracts, and spot assets to be held in the same account, offsetting risks against each other.
• Institutions are showing demand for decentralized exchanges. Coinbase acquired Deribit. Derive's related materials indicate that after this acquisition, Asian trading departments began searching for neutral trading venues; during the market crash on October 10, 2025, Derive's order book maintained normal operations. Recently, Paradex integrated Paradigm's RFQ network into its own public chain; after the integration, open interest in options grew from nearly 0 to over $250 million within three weeks.

Leading On-chain Options Trading Platforms

Derive

From the perspective of market makers, Derive's trading platform is similar to Deribit. Order book matching occurs off-chain, with large or multi-leg strategies utilizing RFQ requests, where multiple market makers provide a complete set of quotes for traders to execute with one click. Settlement, margin, and clearing are all executed on-chain.

Derive has now upgraded to version 3. Users' funds are held on Ethereum L1, with margin and settlement operating through zero-knowledge proofs verified on Ethereum, allowing ETH and BTC to be combined for margin calculations, supporting ETH, WBTC, and HYPE lending, and enabling external teams to deploy vaults to earn fees without writing code.

Large orders of 1,000 BTC, HYPE calendar spread strategies, and March 2027 ETH call options can all be executed because paid market makers will quote. Options and perpetual contracts share the same account, which is significant: market makers selling call options need to continuously hedge, and Derive allows them to complete hedging on the same platform without cross-platform transactions or repeated margin payments.

90% of the industry's on-chain options open interest and premiums are concentrated on this platform. It is also the only platform where the premium market share exceeds the notional trading volume share, representing traders' purchase of real options risk exposure rather than repeatedly trading short-term cheap contracts to inflate trading volume. An article by Alea Research mentions that in 2026, traders on Derive achieve equivalent risk exposure at a cost approximately 40% higher than Deribit. This means Derive wins on trading scale rather than price. The initial performance after the V3 launch is worth close attention.

Paradex

Paradex is a Starknet application chain incubated by Paradigm. Paradigm's institutional RFQ network carries about a quarter of Deribit's large order flow. In mid-September 2026, the platform launched fixed-term options, fully adopting Deribit's trading standards, supporting daily, weekly, and monthly expirations, with USDC cash settlement, strike prices divided by Delta, and integrating Paradigm's counterparties.

Paradex's options open interest surged from nearly 0 to over $250 million within three weeks, then significantly retreated, and rebounded again in early October. Attracting trading volume and retaining it are two distinct challenges, and Paradex has currently only passed the first hurdle.

The RFQ tool displays Deribit prices as a benchmark, effectively connecting directly to Deribit's large trading desk. Multi-leg large orders support institutional-level transactions, while retail trades incur zero fees, with a single cross-margin account covering perpetuals, options, and spot, including underlying assets like gold, oil, and the S&P 500. Reports indicate that in September, a large ETH order on Paradex was executed at a better price than Deribit.

Hypercall

Hypercall is an options product developed by Synapse Labs, transitioning from the cross-chain bridge sector, built on Hyperliquid. Launched in June 2026, it initially offered SpaceX options, later adding S&P 500, NVIDIA, Micron Technology, Alibaba, and SanDisk, with plans to launch LTC and DOGE contracts within the year. Contracts support small splits and are settled in USDC. Option sellers can complete Delta hedging in Hyperliquid's perpetual contract market within the same margin account. This mechanism is not replicable by other platforms unless authorized by Hyperliquid.

It is the only platform where non-listed company options can be purchased without KYC, with a minimum investment of $1 and a fee cap as a portion of the premium. For native traders on Hyperliquid, this is also the cheapest way to bet on stock-like perpetual market trends without paying funding rates.

In the week the platform launched the "Daily $1000 HYPE" reward program, nominal trading volume surged over 50 times, yet the premiums and open positions remained almost unchanged. On this platform, a $1 premium can leverage contracts worth about $1000, while Derive is around $50 in value.

Rysk

Rysk is more focused on yield products rather than trading markets. You deposit HYPE, BTC, or ETH, choose a strike price above the spot price, and sell covered call options to whitelisted market makers. The premium is credited in USD immediately; at expiration, you can either keep the tokens or settle them at the strike price. The logic for cash-secured put options is the opposite.

Since migrating to HyperEVM in 2025, it has become the preferred tool for HYPE holders to earn yields. A Nasdaq-listed HYPE treasury company also operates a treasury on Rysk.

The platform has no order book, no Greek letters, and no clearing mechanism, requiring only one decision per month. You can only act as a seller and cannot buy back options to close positions before expiration; trading volume stagnated after May 2026 due to the limits on the HYPE risk exposure that market makers are willing to take. Full collateral does not equal no risk: if HYPE drops 40% in a month, you still hold HYPE, and the premium can only cover a small portion of the loss.

Aevo

Aevo has a similar structure to Derive: its own L2, off-chain order book, and portfolio margin. It was the largest on-chain options platform by scale in 2024.

From 2025 to 2026, the platform shifted its focus to launching pre-token futures, tokenized stocks, 1000x high-leverage "Degen" contracts, and PERPS+ (perpetual contracts with built-in options-style stop losses). Listed options are limited to BTC, ETH, HYPE, and SOL. While the overall sector grew fourfold, Aevo's options business shrank by over 90%.

You can experience PERPS+: a one-click trading enhancement tool that allows you to attach options strategies to your perpetual positions. PERPS+ enables you to protect, profit, or lock in your perpetual position trades without manually operating the options market, selecting strike prices, or managing various options portfolios—all with a single action.

Dream

Dream is a mobile app, not a protocol. You can recharge using Apple Pay, select assets like BTC, ETH, SOL, HYPE, PUMP, LIT, etc., choose the direction of price movement and trade size, and the app automatically buys call or put options for you.

• Buy call options: bet on price increases
• Buy put options: bet on price decreases
• Prepay the premium, which is the cost of the option. Each contract has a strike price and expiration date. If you buy the option in full, your maximum loss is the premium plus fees.

For example, you can spend $100 to buy a BTC call option. If BTC rises sufficiently before expiration, the option's value increases; if the expected rise does not occur, the option expires worthless, and you lose that $100.

Issues to Address in On-Chain Options

This sector already has institutional bulk settlement layers and retail yield vaults, but there is a significant gap in the trading layer aimed at retail investors.

• Price: The trading costs for equivalent exposures on leading platforms are higher than Deribit. Unless the on-chain order book (not just bulk orders) narrows the spread, there is no reason for retail investors to migrate.
• Concentrated risk for market makers: Public information reveals that Derive can only identify FalconX as a market maker; Paradex only mentions the Paradigm network; Rysk and Hypercall do not disclose their market makers at all. The exit of any market maker from the platform poses the greatest hidden risk to the sector.
• Withdrawal restrictions for vault users: Rysk and Hypersurface users cannot close positions before expiration. A covered call option that cannot be bought back early has a weaker product experience than Deribit.
• Oracle and operator risks: Paradex experienced a chain rollback in January; Aevo's old treasury was hacked due to an oracle upgrade; Hypersurface can decide to exercise early; Derive V3's multi-signature account can bypass time locks. Currently, none of these platforms have minimized trust.

Simple Trading Strategies for Options Beginners

Buy Call Options as an Alternative to Leveraged Longs

HYPE is priced at about $87. You believe it will rise but are concerned about a potential pullback. You buy a call option with a strike price of $90, with a premium of $4/HYPE. The breakeven point is $94. If HYPE is priced at $100 at expiration, you profit $6 per contract after deducting the premium; if the price is $90 or below, you lose the entire $4 premium.

The key consideration is time. A one-time payment of the premium for a call option does not trigger liquidation during short-term pullbacks, but the price must rise before expiration; otherwise, the premium will be entirely lost.

Buy Put Options to Insure Your Spot Holdings

ETH is priced at about $2560. You hold 10 ETH and want to guard against a significant drop. You buy a put option with a strike price of $2300 to cover your entire holding, with a premium of $50/ETH, totaling $500.

If ETH drops to $2000 at expiration, this put option pays out $3000. Including the premium, your total loss is $3100; without hedging, the loss would reach $5600.

The cost is the premium you need to pay, and there is an expiration time. If ETH is above $2300 at expiration, the option expires worthless.

Sell Covered Call Options at Your Desired Selling Price

You hold HYPE at an average cost of about $87 and are willing to sell at $100. You deposit HYPE in Rysk and sell a call option with a strike price of $100, receiving the premium upfront (example: $2/HYPE).

If HYPE is below $100 at expiration, you keep the tokens and the premium. If HYPE rises to $120 at expiration, your HYPE is settled at $100, and you still keep the premium.

The cost is that you forfeit all gains above $100, while the risk of asset decline is entirely yours. The margin will be locked until settlement is completed.

Sell Cash-Secured Put Options at Your Desired Bottom Price

BTC is about $84000, and you are willing to buy at $80000. You sell a put option covering 1 BTC, locking $80000 in stablecoins as collateral, and receive an example premium of $2000.

If BTC is above $80000 at expiration, you get back the stablecoins and keep the premium. If BTC is below $80000 at expiration, you buy BTC at $80000, and the premium lowers your effective cost to $78000.

However, if BTC drops to $60000, you still have to buy at $80000. The funds are locked until settlement.

Conclusion

On-chain options are currently the largest pillar in the crypto derivatives field.

The vast majority of crypto options trading still occurs on centralized platforms. The nominal trading volume of on-chain options recently hit a two-year high, but the $5.49 billion trading volume over the past 30 days is only 6.9% of Deribit’s $79.8 billion. Just Deribit alone has a volume 14.5 times that of all on-chain platforms combined.

The huge gap also signifies a tremendous opportunity; the next challenge for this sector is to attract a continuous and stable flow of retail trading.