If we can take a moment to be intellectually honest here:
1/ The CFTC action taken was for centralized registered actors, not fully permissionless non-KYC offshore venues.
2/ Hyperliquid can't just pull a regulated exchange rabbit out of a hat here. This requires a DCM registration/exemption, which introduces KYC/AML, FCM (for customer funds), trade surveillance, sanctions, etc. This isn't a retroactive "bolt-on" to buy legitimacy and wave a magic wand to forgive the lack of KYC and gray capital facilitation. Yes, you could consider the route where they buy a U.S. DCM, but this inherently bifurcates liquidity and undercuts the "house of all finance."
3/ Crypto perps fall under the CFTC's commodity-derivatives guidance, but equity-linked perps are a messier animal, and sit in the security-based swap world (dragging the SEC into the conversation). Pre-IPO/private equity perps raise a whole set of additional considerations (e.g. price manipulation with no underlying spot market). The moment a permissionless venue spins up a legal entity to hold a license, it becomes remarkably close to rebuilding a CEX.
4/ Hyperliquid is a meaningful infrastructure layer that found PMF in the wilderness of permissionless non-KYC offshore venues. Great. It has just over 1.2mm wallet addresses (not individuals): a relatively impressive, but, in aggregate, small market-share in the grand scheme of things. We're still so early in this game of market microstructure evolution, and it'll be exciting to see how it plays out.
Is our intern trading this market well?
No.
Are they studying bad trades to improve?
No.
But are they positioned onchain to spot a new trend early and put size into the next runner?
Also no.