3 Months to the Top, 50% Market Share: Who's Leading the New DeFi Wave?
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3 Months to the Top, 50% Market Share: Who's Leading the New DeFi Wave?
This article will elaborate in detail on SynFutures' core advantages, project progress, and ways to participate.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsAuthor: Wilson Lee, Core Contributor at Biteye
Editor: Crush, Core Contributor at Biteye
In early July this year, the decentralized derivatives exchange SynFutures announced its launch on Base. Within just three months, SynFutures rapidly rose to become the top player in the Base derivatives market, capturing half of the market share throughout Q3—once again drawing significant attention from the market!
What exactly makes SynFutures innovative?
How does it attract users through incentive programs, and what are some current opportunities worth participating in?
This article by Biteye will comprehensively explore SynFutures’ core advantages, project developments, and ways to get involved.
SynFutures launched at the end of 2021 and began gaining momentum in the first half of this year. Leveraging its pioneering permissionless contract market model, it allows anyone to add liquidity with a single token and list new markets within 30 seconds. Supporting both perpetual and expiring futures contracts, SynFutures delivers an exceptional user experience.
Moreover, SynFutures has demonstrated sharp market insight by strategically expanding into the Blast and Base ecosystems, successfully achievingdominant positions on both networks.
Since launching on Blast in March and Base in July, SynFutures has accumulated over $180 billion in trading volume, with nearly 300,000 unique addresses having traded on the platform.
It currently supports more than 45 trading pairs, including major assets like BTC and ETH, as well as trending sectors such as MEME coins and U.S. election prediction markets—truly returning the power of DeFi listing decisions back to the community.
01 Project Innovation: Oyster AMM
Derivatives trading platforms face a series of challenges: traditional AMMs allow anyone to list tokens and provide market-making, but often sacrifice capital efficiency.
Order book models maximize capital efficiency, yet struggle to support arbitrary risk assets. SynFutures addresses these issues with its proprietary Oyster AMM (oAMM), which seamlessly integrates fully on-chain matching, on-chain order books, and AMM mechanisms—combining the high capital efficiency of CeFi with the permissionless and decentralized nature of DeFi.
SynFutures' contracts have been audited by QuantStamp.
The Oyster AMM (oAMM) is central to SynFutures, featuringthree key characteristics: concentrated liquidity, order-book-enhanced AMM powered entirely on-chain, and user-protective stability mechanisms.
1.1 Concentrated Liquidity
In oAMM, liquidity can beconcentrated within specific price ranges (similar to UniSwap V3), increasingcapital efficiency within those ranges by focusing funds where trades are most likely to occur, rather than spreading them across the entire price spectrum.
Additionally, oAMMsupports single-sided liquidity provision, allowing liquidity providers (LPs) to contribute only one type of token—lowering entry barriers and reducing exposure risks.
oAMM achievesconcentrated liquidity and enablessingle-sided deposits through the following mechanisms:
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Concentrated liquidity range: oAMM allows LPs to allocate their funds within defined price intervals. This means LPs can choose to provide liquidity in price zones they believe will see the most activity, instead of across the full price curve (akin to Uniswap V3).
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Simulating trades via virtual positions: When an LP provides liquidity under oAMM (e.g., depositing only USDC for the ETH-USDC pair), the system creates a corresponding virtual position behind the scenes. This virtual position represents exposure relative to the other asset (in this case, ETH). This mechanism enables one-sided liquidity while maintaining market balance.
1.2 Order Book-Enhanced AMM Powered On-Chain
Integrating a fully on-chain order book with AMM is a defining feature of the oAMM model. "Fully on-chain" ensures decentralization and security, while the "order book" enhances AMM functionality by delivering deeper liquidity and improved user experience.
A fully on-chain order book means all trading orders (buy/sell instructions) are recorded and stored directly on the blockchain, with trade matching also executed on-chain—rather than relying on traditional centralized servers or partially centralized systems.
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Clever implementation of order books: oAMM simulates limit orders by allowing users to provide liquidity at specified price points, effectively replicating order book behavior on-chain. This boosts capital efficiency. Unlike off-chain order books used by platforms like dYdX, oAMM operates via smart contracts deployed directly on the blockchain, with all data publicly verifiable. This ensures full decentralization, eliminating concerns about hidden manipulation or fake trading activities.
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Exceptional liquidity depth: While several AMMs offer concentrated liquidity (e.g., Uniswap V3), concentrating liquidity increases demands on depth around focal points. Compared to standard AMM market-making, professional market makers from centralized exchanges are more familiar and comfortable with limit-order-based strategies, making them more inclined to participate. Thus, supporting limit orders enables oAMM to attract active market makers, significantly enhancing trading efficiency and depth, offering a trading experience comparable to centralized exchanges.
In summary, oAMM skillfully combines fully on-chain order books with AMM mechanics, solving one of the toughest challenges in DEXs—liquidity provisioning—while preserving the transparency benefits of on-chain transactions. It truly merges the strengths of DEXs and CEXs.
1.3 User-Protective Stability Mechanisms
SynFutures has also implemented a suite of mechanisms designed to maintain market stability and protect user interests. These safeguards prevent extreme volatility and minimize unnecessary risks, ensuring a healthy and fair trading environment.
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Dynamic penalty fees: To deter price manipulation and extreme market swings, oAMM introduces a dynamic penalty fee mechanism. If a trade causes the market price to deviate beyond a certain threshold from the mark price, an additional fee is applied. This fee scales with the deviation, discouraging potential manipulative behavior.
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Stable mark pricing: oAMM uses algorithms such as exponential moving average (EMA) to smooth out price fluctuations, reducing the risk of liquidations caused by sudden news events or manipulation. A stable mark price helps avoid unnecessary forced liquidations triggered by short-term spikes.
Through these mechanisms, SynFutures imposes costs on manipulative actions, reducing incentives for market abuse. Meanwhile, price smoothing mitigates excessive reactions due to突发事件 or large trades, protecting users from unwarranted losses. Furthermore, by maintaining stable mark prices and continuous funding rates, SynFutures reduces unexpected liquidations caused by volatile price movements, strengthening user protection and effectively preserving market stability within the oAMM framework.
02 Project Progress
2.1 Solidifying Position in Blast Ecosystem, Rewarding Users
Shortly after launching on Blast in March, SynFutures quickly established itself as the leading derivatives trading platform in the Blast ecosystem. While delivering an excellent user experience, it also rolled out generous incentive programs that drove strong user growth and retention.
At launch, SynFutures introduced the O_O (Oyster Odyssey) points rewards program. Not only did it promise future token airdrops to O_O point holders, but it also committed to passing back 100% of all Blast-related incentives—including points, yield, and additional developer token airdrops—directly to users.
With a $500,000 trading competition and triple airdrop opportunities, SynFutures provided powerful incentives for user participation.
During the campaign, Blast users, dYdX/GMX users, and Pudgy Penguin NFT holders were eligible to claim free O_O points upon registration on day one.
In addition, users providing liquidity (makers and AMM LPs) or executing trades (takers) received +50% bonus toward Blast Big Bang Winner airdrops, earned Blast-native points, and accumulated SynFutures O_O points. Traders could also earn extra rewards from the trading competition.
Participants in SynFutures’ Blast campaigns reported substantial gains. Currently, the O_O rewards program is now live on Base, allowing users to earn points through trading and LP provision on the Base network.
2.2 Expanding into Base Ecosystem: Growth and Innovation
SynFutures announced its launch on Base in early July and by the end of September had secured absolute leadership in the Base derivatives market, capturing approximately 50% of the market share during Q3.
At the end of September, SynFutures further expanded its offerings by launching the Vault product line on Base. Users can now deposit a single token to earn returns from liquidity provision, platform trading fees, and O_O points. Key features of Vaults include:
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Fund Deposit and Management: Users deposit funds into Vaults, which automatically manage liquidity provisioning and rebalancing across designated markets, while simultaneously earning reward points.
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Simplified Market Making: Vaults automate market-making strategies, eliminating the need for frequent manual interventions required when self-managing.
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Risk Diversification: By allocating funds across different Vaults, users can diversify their exposure across multiple assets, reducing concentration risk.
Source: https://oyster.synfutures.com/#/vault/base/0x152d6356da0b84eb796247b03b3a17a791d83c42
Similar to its Blast campaign, users on Base can earn O_O points by providing liquidity or trading. With the introduction of Vaults, users now have an easier way to generate yield and accumulate O_O points through SynFutures.
Furthermore, the SynFutures campaign interface reveals even more ways to earn points, demonstrating the platform’s genuine commitment to rewarding its community.
Source: https://oyster.synfutures.com/#/campaign
In current campaigns, SynFutures also includes a leaderboard page to encourage competitive participation, adding an engaging gamified element.
Source: https://oyster.synfutures.com/#/odyssey
On-chain data shows that Base is increasingly becoming a growth engine for SynFutures, highlighting the platform’s agility and adaptability. This trend also reflects strong user认可 of SynFutures’ product experience and incentive design on Base.
Source: https://info.synfutures.com/
03 Core Advantages and Competitive Comparison
3.1 Market Position
Several derivatives platforms already hold established positions in the market, including dYdX, Hyperliquid, GMX, and others.
Observing derivative volumes across major chains since March via DefiLlama, from March to September, Hyperliquid and dYdX maintained leading positions with daily trading volumes around $1.5 billion. SynFutures consistently achieved around $1 billion in daily volume, outperforming competitors like Jupiter and GMX and placing it firmly within the first tier of the derivatives sector.
Since September, overall market conditions have led to declining volumes across most platforms. Hyperliquid remains at the top with ~$1.5B daily volume, while SynFutures surpassed dYdX with ~$600M in daily volume.
As the newest entrant among major platforms, achieving such a prominent market position so quickly indicates broad market认可.
SynFutures V3 Derivatives Volume, Source: https://defillama.com/protocol/synfutures
GMX Derivatives Volume, Source: https://defillama.com/protocol/gmx?volume=true
dYdX Derivatives Volume, Source: https://defillama.com/protocol/dydx
Jupiter Perpetual Exchange Derivatives Volume: Source: https://defillama.com/protocol/jupiter-perpetual-exchange
Hyperliquid Derivatives Volume, Source: https://defillama.com/protocol/hyperliquid?derivativesVolume=true
3.2 Core Advantages
SynFutures’ rapid success stems from its distinct advantages:
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Mixed on-chain order book + AMM model combining decentralization, deep liquidity, and capital efficiency: dYdX and Hyperliquid rely solely on order books—efficient but limiting asset diversity. GMX’s pool-based model faces scalability bottlenecks tied to LP capacity and limited asset options. In contrast, SynFutures combines on-chain order books with AMM, achieving both deep DEX-level liquidity and near-CEX capital efficiency—all in a decentralized framework.
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Community-driven listing decisions: Most derivative platforms use centralized governance for listings. SynFutures empowers the community to decide which assets get listed, enabling permissionless 30-second market creation. During the recent MEME coin surge, SynFutures was among the first to list $BOME, setting the market pace.
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Supports any ERC-20 token as margin: SynFutures allows any ERC-20 token to be used as collateral for trading, whereas most platforms only accept a few stablecoins like USDC or ETH.
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Fully on-chain order matching: All trade matching occurs on-chain, ensuring complete transparency and preventing manipulation. Competitors like dYdX and Hyperliquid perform matching off-chain, introducing potential centralization risks.
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Transparent airdrops and token issuance expectations: SynFutures V3 focuses on the Blast and Base ecosystems, offering users deposit yields, point incentives, and ecosystem-linked airdrops—a combination unmatched by platforms like dYdX or Hyperliquid. Moreover, SynFutures is one of the few leading derivatives platforms yet to issue a native token. The team has indicated ongoing research into tokenomics, hinting at future token launches and airdrops. Official channels confirm that users of earlier versions and past campaign participants will receive special recognition and rewards.
Source: https://www.synfutures.com/
04 Team and Background
SynFutures’ founding team brings extensive experience from top-tier international investment banks, tech companies, and crypto OGs. It has attracted backing from leading investors including Pantera, Polychain, Standard Crypto, Dragonfly, Framework, SIG, Hashkey, IOSG, Bybit, Wintermute, CMS, and Woo, raising over $38 million to date.
Source: https://www.rootdata.com/Projects/detail/SynFutures?k=MzAyMA%3D%3D
05 Summary and Outlook
In the fiercely competitive landscape of decentralized finance (DeFi) derivatives, SynFutures stands out through technological innovation and strategic execution.
By introducing fully on-chain order books and matching, unified liquidity models, and robust user-protection mechanisms, SynFutures provides users with a secure, transparent, and highly efficient trading environment—strengthening its competitiveness and appeal.
Beyond technology, SynFutures demonstrates long-term vision through generous incentive programs and deep integration with the Blast and Base ecosystems.
Generous airdrops, trading competitions, and continuous innovations like the Vault product not only drive active user engagement but also inject fresh vitality into the market. This reciprocal value-sharing strengthens ties between SynFutures, its users, and broader ecosystem partners, fostering sustained growth.
Through technical innovation, user safeguards, incentive design, and clear future planning, SynFutures has built a secure, reliable, and vibrant trading platform. These strengths enable it to meet current user demands while adapting to future market shifts—positioning it for continued leadership in the decentralized exchange space.
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