Real-world perps flourish, Altcoins languish.
Trading volume for onchain perpetual futures linked to real-world commodities such as precious metals and oil is rising, indicating investors are flocking from altcoins to commodity-linked digital assets, according to a report published Thursday by digital asset bank Signum.
Oil and precious metals trading volume on HyperLiquid Decentralized Exchange (DEX) will exceed 67% of HIP-3 contracts in Q1 2026, also known as “Developer-Deployed Perpetuals” on the HyperLiquid platform.
In the past, indexes covered 90% of the HIP-3 business, but this has dropped to 17%, according to Sygnum.
Weekend HIP-3 trading activity has grown by nearly 9x since January 2026, the report added, “This is likely due to an improvement in crypto-native traders' rotation into traditional assets while the broader altcoin market continues to underperform.
Lucas Schweiger, Sygnum's Digital Asset Ecosystem Research Leader, told Cointelegraph that this shift to onchain digital assets has led to a 250% year-over-year increase in market capitalization of real-world assets (RWAs).
At the time of writing, approximately $23 billion in tokenized real-world assets are being traded on permissionless blockchain networks.
He also said that traders view altcoins as “backed BTC proxies”. Schweiger told Cointelegraph:
“This creates an environment where crypto-native capital naturally looks like traditional assets that can be traded in wallets, same margin, different business.”
The ongoing war in the Middle East and the disruption of energy infrastructure have caused oil prices to rise, with many altcoins already down 80-90 percent, according to Sygnum.
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As the war in the Middle East progresses, the economic recession becomes a growing concern.
The war between the United States, Israel and Iran has disrupted critical energy infrastructure in the Middle East and sent world oil prices soaring to around $120 a barrel.
Oil prices have been rising or falling since the start of the conflict, depending on the comments made by US President Donald Trump and the Iranian government or changes in the geopolitical crisis.
If oil prices remain above $100 per barrel in 2026, inflation will increase, said Nick Pukrin, founder of the Coinbureau media site.
Traders are still pricing in a possible escalation or a quick end to the conflict, but Puchrin warned they could be in for a “stealth revival” if the crisis persists and higher inflation ends hopes of further interest rate cuts in 2026.
Since the beginning of the conflict In the year
The US economy now has a nearly 50% chance of entering a recession by 2026, according to ratings agency Moody's.
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