Why Hyperliquid’s CEO says banks are undervaluing a potential SpaceX IPO

Traditional IPOs are usually controlled by big investment banks. But as crypto-native markets grow, they’re starting to challenge how these deals get priced. One of the clearest examples right now is SpaceX, where perpetual futures on a decentralized exchange are already trading at a much higher valuation than what banks are talking about.

How Hyperliquid is pricing SpaceX before its IPO

Hyperliquid is a decentralized derivatives exchange that lets traders buy and sell perpetual futures on various assets, including pre-IPO names. That means people can speculate on the value of a company like SpaceX before it ever lists on a stock exchange.

According to Hyperliquid Strategies CEO David Seamus, SpaceX perpetuals on the platform have been trading well above the $135 per share level that’s been floated in traditional markets. At one point, he notes, the market was closer to $190–$200 per share. That’s a meaningful gap between what banks might price the deal at and what a live, 24/7 market is already willing to pay.

Importantly, this isn’t just paper speculation. Real money is changing hands on these contracts every day, creating a continuous signal of what active traders think SpaceX is worth.

What perpetual futures are and why they matter

Perpetual futures (or “perps”) are a type of derivative that track the price of an underlying asset without an expiry date. Instead of settling on a fixed date like traditional futures, they use a funding rate mechanism to keep the perp price anchored near the spot or implied value.

On Hyperliquid, traders can use perps to express a view on assets that aren’t easily accessible elsewhere, including pre-IPO companies. If you think SpaceX is undervalued, you can go long its perp. If you think it’s overhyped, you can go short. The balance of these views shows up in the live price.

Seamus argues that this kind of open, continuous market can be a powerful tool for price discovery—especially when compared to a one-time IPO pricing decision made behind closed doors by a handful of banks.

What Cerberus taught markets about IPO pricing

To back up his point, Seamus points to a recent example: the Cerberus IPO. Before the stock listed, Cerberus was already trading on Hyperliquid via perpetual futures. If you charted the pre-IPO Hyperliquid price and then looked at where Cerberus actually traded after the IPO, the line was almost perfectly straight.

In other words, the decentralized perp market had already “decided” on a fair value. When the IPO finally priced, investment banks set the deal significantly lower than that implied value. Once trading opened, the stock quickly moved up toward the level that Hyperliquid’s market had been signaling all along.

That gap between IPO price and actual trading price is what Seamus calls out as a cost. A big “IPO pop” looks exciting, but it effectively transfers value from existing shareholders (who sold too cheaply) to new investors who bought at the underpriced level.

Are banks underpricing big IPOs on purpose?

Seamus has been vocal for years that investment banks tend to underprice IPOs. A small discount—say 3–5%—might be reasonable to reward new investors for taking risk and to ensure a smooth deal. But when you see 30–35% pops, like with Cerberus, he argues that’s too much value left on the table.

In the SpaceX case, if banks price the IPO around $135 while a liquid derivatives market is consistently trading closer to $190–$200, that suggests a similar underpricing dynamic could be forming. Whether or not SpaceX ultimately deserves that higher valuation is a separate question. What matters for Seamus is that there’s already a market sending a strong signal—and that signal shouldn’t be ignored.

Who is actually trading these SpaceX perpetuals?

One fair question is whether the people trading SpaceX perps on Hyperliquid are the same kind of investors who will buy the stock when it eventually lists. Seamus says the overlap is probably high, with one big caveat: Hyperliquid isn’t currently available in the United States.

That means the traders setting these prices are mostly non-U.S. participants. Even so, they’re clearly market-savvy, plugged into global finance, and willing to put capital behind their views on names like Cerberus and SpaceX.

He also points out that traditional institutions are already watching these markets. During the Cerberus IPO, someone shared a photo from the Morgan Stanley trading floor showing a Hyperliquid screen up on Bloomberg. The signal was visible; the question is whether banks are truly incorporating it into their pricing decisions.

Regulation: why U.S. traders are mostly locked out

Perpetual futures on individual pre-IPO names aren’t generally available to U.S. traders today. Hyperliquid and similar decentralized exchanges typically geo-block U.S. users due to regulatory uncertainty.

There are early signs of change. The CFTC recently approved a cash-settled Bitcoin perpetual futures contract, which Seamus sees as an important first step. But he’s realistic: there’s a long way to go between a regulated Bitcoin perp and a regulated SpaceX perp.

He frames it as a trade-off of living in the U.S. The regulatory system has helped build a strong, stable economy, but it also acts as a kind of “access tax.” Non-U.S. traders can use cutting-edge products and markets that Americans simply can’t touch yet.

Technology is moving faster than regulation

Seamus argues that the core issue is a mismatch between old rules and new tools. Many of the KYC and financial regulations that govern markets today were designed around 2001. Crypto and decentralized exchanges, meanwhile, are built on technology that’s 20–25 years ahead of that regulatory baseline.

Hyperliquid itself is a good example. It was founded in 2023, has a tiny team—around a dozen employees—and yet has built a global, high-performance derivatives platform that can price everything from Bitcoin to pre-IPO tech giants in real time.

In parallel, we’ve seen an explosion of new ways to express views on events and prices: prediction markets, event contracts, and more. These tools are all competing and overlapping, and the market is still figuring out how they fit together.

Perpetuals vs. event contracts and prediction markets

For investors, one practical question is how perps compare to other new instruments like event contracts or prediction markets. They’re not exactly apples-to-apples.

Event contracts are usually binary: you bet on whether something will or won’t happen (for example, “Will Bitcoin close above $60,000 on a certain date?”). Payouts are fixed and tied to that outcome. Prediction markets work similarly, with prices reflecting the probability of an event.

Perpetual futures, on the other hand, give you continuous exposure to a price level. You’re not betting on a yes/no outcome; you’re trading the implied value of an asset over time. For something like a SpaceX IPO, a perp lets you express a nuanced view on valuation, not just on whether the IPO will be “hot” or “cold.”

As these instruments mature, it’s likely we’ll see some competition for trader attention and liquidity. If perps on individual names become widely available and regulated, they could easily take market share from more limited event-style products.

What this means for crypto and traditional markets

The SpaceX debate is bigger than one company. It highlights how crypto-native infrastructure is starting to influence traditional finance. When a decentralized exchange can front-run Wall Street on price discovery for major IPOs, the role of banks as sole gatekeepers starts to weaken.

We’ve already seen crypto markets front-run and shape narratives around Bitcoin, from spot ETF approvals to macro-driven selloffs. If you’re interested in how sentiment and derivatives can drive price, it’s worth looking at analyses like why bitcoin is getting crushed by fear and what might come next or how large institutional players behave during big drawdowns, as in the MicroStrategy and Michael Saylor bitcoin drawdown story.

Now, the same kind of 24/7, globally accessible price discovery is being pointed at private companies and pre-IPO giants. Whether regulators embrace or resist this shift will shape how much value gets left on the table in future IPOs—and who gets access to the real market signal.

Key takeaways for traders and investors

1. Perps can be powerful price signals. When there’s enough liquidity and real money at stake, perpetual futures on platforms like Hyperliquid can offer a strong hint at where an asset might trade once it’s more widely listed.

2. IPO pops aren’t free. A big first-day jump in an IPO price may look great on headlines, but it usually means the company sold shares too cheaply. That value came out of existing holders’ pockets.

3. Access is still uneven. Non-U.S. traders can already participate in these cutting-edge markets, while U.S. traders are mostly sidelined for now. Regulatory changes—like the CFTC’s approval of a Bitcoin perp—could slowly narrow that gap.

4. The line between crypto and TradFi is blurring. As decentralized exchanges start influencing how traditional assets are priced, both sides of the market will need to adapt—banks, regulators, and traders alike.

For now, SpaceX’s implied price on Hyperliquid is a live experiment in how crypto-native tools might reshape one of Wall Street’s most tightly controlled processes: the IPO.