Hyperliquid governance vote aims to permanently sideline $1B Assistance Fund

The Hyper Foundation proposed a validator vote to formally recognize HYPE tokens held in the Hyperliquid protocol’s Assistance Fund system address as permanently inaccessible, excluding them from the asset’s circulating and total supply. 

According to the Foundation, the Assistance Fund is a protocol-level mechanism embedded in the layer-1 network’s execution. It automatically converts trading fees into HYPE tokens and routes them to a designated system address. At the time of writing, the wallet contains about $1 billion in tokens. 

The system address was designed without control mechanisms, making the funds irretrievable without a hard fork. “By voting ‘Yes,’ validators agree to treat the Assistance Fund HYPE as burned,” Hyper Foundation wrote. 

Native Markets, the issuer of the Hyperliquid-native stablecoin USDH, reminded users that 50% of the stablecoin’s reserve yield is routed to the Assistance Fund and converted into HYPE tokens. “Should this validator vote pass, these contributions will then be formally recognized as burned,” the company wrote. 

Clarifying supply amid institutional interest

While the proposal uses the term “burned,” it does not reduce the existing supply. Instead, it formalizes how the fee-derived tokens are treated for governance purposes, reducing ambiguity around Hyper’s effective supply. 

The distinction has become more relevant as Hyperliquid’s fee-driven model has been attracting institutional attention. 

In a research note covering Hyperliquid-focused digital asset treasuries (DATs), financial services firm Cantor Fitzgerald framed Hyperliquid as a protocol that returns nearly all of its fee revenue to tokenholders through automated repurchases. 

Cantor estimated that Hyperliquid generated approximately $874 million in fees year-to-date (YTD) as of 2025. The company said 99% of protocol fees are routed through the Assistance Fund mechanism to repurchase HYPE. 

The firm characterized the repurchases as a contributor to a declining circulating supply. However, the Hyper Foundation’s proposal drew a clear line by recognizing that the Assistance Fund balances were never intended to be spendable or recoverable. 

The vote aims to align supply metrics with protocol design, rather than creating scarcity retroactively. 

Related: 1.75M Hyperliquid tokens unlocked today, but was the price impacted?

Hyperliquid volume and HYPE DAT holdings

Hyperliquid remains one of the top contenders in the perpetual decentralized exchange (DEX) space. In the last 30 days, DefiLlama data shows that the protocol recorded over $205 billion in perpetuals trading volume, making it the third-largest perps DEX in the time frame. 

Furthermore, a growing ecosystem of DAT companies has emerged around HYPE. According to Cantor, Hyperion DeFi (HYPD) holds about $46 million in HYPE tokens in its treasury, while Hyperliquid Strategies (PURR) holds about $340 million.