Grayscale Investments has launched the Grayscale Hyperliquid Staking ETF on Nasdaq, the firm’s third major spot altcoin ETP launch of 2026 and the first U.S.-listed Hyperliquid product to combine direct HYPE exposure with active network staking.
The fund, trading under the ticker HYPG, began trading on Nasdaq on Wednesday, June 3, with a 0.29% management fee—the lowest gross management fee among the three U.S. spot Hyperliquid ETPs now on the market. The launch was announced in a Grayscale press release.
The 0.29% fee positions HYPG directly against the two earlier Hyperliquid ETP entrants. Bitwise’s BHYP launched with a 0% introductory fee that rises to 0.34% after the first month, while 21Shares’ THYP carries a 0.30% fee. Grayscale’s pricing—undercutting both—signals that the firm is competing aggressively on cost rather than relying on its brand advantage and trust-conversion playbook alone.
The Staking Differentiator
HYPG is structured differently from its rivals in one key respect: it is the only Hyperliquid ETP in the U.S. designed to participate in HYPE’s native staking mechanism.
According to Grayscale, the fund will seek to generate additional returns by participating in the network’s staking process, with earned staking rewards—net of applicable fees and expenses—potentially reflected in the fund’s net asset value. The firm cited stakingrewards.com data showing HYPE staking rewards have historically averaged approximately 2.2% annually based on a daily average from May 1, 2025 to April 21, 2026.
The staking design has direct implications for total return. A passive HYPE ETF charging 0.30% on price exposure alone provides simple beta to the token. HYPG, by contrast, offers price exposure plus a potential ~2.2% annual yield component, effectively positioning the product as a more capital-efficient way to hold HYPE for investors who would otherwise have to stake the token themselves through a wallet or staking service.
In a statement accompanying the launch, Krista Lynch, Senior Vice President, Capital Markets at Grayscale, said, “HYPG is structured to provide investors a straightforward way to access the growth potential of HYPE and participate in its staking activity through an exchange-traded product, carrying the lowest gross fee in its category as more of the world’s financial infrastructure continues to move onchain.”
Anchorage Digital as Custodian: A Departure from Coinbase Dominance
The Grayscale HYPG product page confirms one of the more strategically significant operational details: digital asset custody is being handled by Anchorage Digital Bank N.A., not Coinbase Custody Trust Company.
The custodian choice represents a meaningful departure from the structure of most U.S. crypto ETFs. Coinbase Custody serves as the primary custodian for nearly every U.S.-traded spot Bitcoin ETF, with Fidelity Digital Assets the main exception.
By selecting Anchorage Digital — the first and only federally chartered crypto bank in the United States — Grayscale is leaning into the regulatory advantages of an OCC-chartered qualified custodian rather than defaulting to industry-standard infrastructure.
The switch was made in an April 20 amendment, with Grayscale removing Coinbase as both prime broker and custodian in favor of Anchorage. Several factors likely contributed to the decision.
Coinbase is now a direct competitor to Hyperliquid in derivatives trading — Coinbase reported approximately $1.4 trillion in notional derivatives volume across 2025 and early 2026, while Hyperliquid handled approximately $2.6 trillion over the same period — creating an obvious conflict for a Coinbase-custodied ETF backed by Hyperliquid’s native token. Anchorage’s federally chartered status also gives it qualified custodian designation under federal banking law, a credential the SEC has increasingly scrutinized in digital asset custody arrangements.
Grayscale has used Anchorage as a secondary custodian for portions of its Bitcoin and Ethereum trust holdings since August 2025, but the HYPG launch marks the first time Grayscale has named Anchorage as the primary digital asset custodian for one of its products. The same firm is also expanding its institutional DeFi footprint elsewhere—Ethena tapped Anchorage Digital Bank to shield its DeFi credit infrastructure through the Atlas platform, the same day HYPG went live.
Bank of New York Mellon serves as fund administrator, Foreside Fund Services acts as marketing agent, and the fund tracks the CoinDesk Hyperliquid Benchmark Extended Rate.
The Three-Way Hyperliquid ETP Race
HYPG enters a U.S. market that has already established meaningful demand for regulated Hyperliquid exposure. 21Shares launched THYP on Nasdaq on May 12, followed by Bitwise’s BHYP on NYSE Arca on May 15. The two products together logged a combined opening-day volume of $6.11 million—the strongest altcoin ETP debut of 2026 — and have since attracted approximately $132 million in net inflows over their first three weeks of trading.
The competitive structure now resembles the early stages of the Bitcoin and Ethereum ETF launches in 2024, where fee differentiation, staking access (in the case of ETH products), and issuer brand all became battlegrounds for inflows. Grayscale’s positioning at 0.29% is one basis point below 21Shares and five basis points below Bitwise — narrow margins in absolute terms, but meaningful in a category where institutional allocators routinely compare expense ratios when choosing between functionally similar products.
The Hyperliquid Backdrop
The launch lands during one of the most attention-rich stretches in Hyperliquid’s history. HYPE hit a new all-time high above $73 on June 1 and flipped Dogecoin to enter the top 10 cryptocurrencies by market capitalization, with a $16.24 billion valuation as of this week.
Hyperliquid’s fundamental profile has also strengthened. The protocol earned approximately $857 million in fees in 2025, with 99% of those fees flowing back into the protocol via HYPE buybacks — a structural feature that has made HYPE one of the most value-accretive tokens in DeFi. Grayscale specifically highlighted that mechanic in its launch communications, framing Hyperliquid as a “credible path to becoming a core piece of onchain financial infrastructure.”
What Comes Next
The product page also confirms the fund’s reference index as the CoinDesk Hyperliquid Benchmark Extended Rate, distinguishing HYPG’s price benchmark from competitors—21Shares’ THYP tracks the FTSE Hyperliquid Index, while Bitwise’s BHYP uses CME CF Reference Rates.
For Grayscale, HYPG’s launch is also part of a broader push. The firm filed Amendment No. 3 for its Grayscale BNB ETF (GBNB) — the same day as HYPG’s launch — and is pursuing additional altcoin ETF products across its pipeline, including its historic Zcash ETF filing and over 36 altcoins on its Q1 2026 “Assets Under Consideration” list.
For institutional allocators, HYPG now joins THYP and BHYP as a viable regulated access point for HYPE exposure. For Hyperliquid itself, the third U.S. spot ETP further deepens the institutional integration of a protocol that — until 18 months ago — was largely a niche on-chain derivatives venue used by professional crypto traders.
