# Castle Labs

> Castle Labs is a crypto research firm publishing free, independent blockchain research on perpetual DEXs, DeFi, real-world assets, stablecoins, options and market structure, with digital asset research and advisory for protocols, ecosystems and funds.

Castle Labs is a crypto research and digital asset strategy firm. We produce human-centric research and distribution campaigns for companies and advise them on how to navigate an ever-changing market environment. Our work combines deep research with built-in distribution channels, alongside close partnerships delivering strategic clarity across critical moments of growth.

## Services

- **Research Media**: Feature articles (up to 2,000 words), in-depth research reports (~3,000 words), newsletter sponsorship to 7,000+ newsletter readers, and coordinated multi-channel distribution across X, Substack, LinkedIn, and Telegram.
- **Advisory Solutions**: Research and strategy, marketing and GTM, business development and fundraising, due diligence, tokenomics modeling, and network brokerage.

## Flagship Reports

Free to read. Each report page has the key findings, data tables, FAQs and the report's charts, with most charts refreshed daily from DefiLlama, CoinGecko, Hyperliquid and other public data. All reports: https://castlelabs.io/research/reports

- Mapping the Perpetual Trading Ecosystem (October 2026, 81 pages): https://castlelabs.io/research/reports/mapping-the-perpetual-trading-ecosystem
  Compares Hyperliquid, Lighter, Variational, TradeXYZ, Ondo, QFEX, edgeX, Extended, Pacifica, GMX, Jupiter, Kalshi and Polymarket perps on design, liquidation backstops, token value accrual, turnover and take rate, with a live microstructure test of execution cost, depth, funding and index quality against Binance, Bybit and OKX. Hyperliquid holds over 56% of onchain perp open interest; onchain venues handle over 13% of perp volume; RWA perps reached $123 billion in August 2026 volume.
- The Verticalisation Thesis: How Blockchain Revenue Models Are Evolving (July 2026, 53 pages): https://castlelabs.io/research/reports/the-verticalisation-thesis-how-blockchain
  Ethereum chain fees fell from $9.91 billion in 2021 to $523 million in 2025 (down 94.7%), while Hyperliquid generated over $1 billion in fees in 12 months, $881 million of it from its perp DEX. Covers Hyperliquid HIP-3, Arbitrum Timeboost, MegaETH, Plasma and exchange chains.
- Fixed-Rate Lending: Market Structure and Protocol Design (August 2026, 34 pages): https://castlelabs.io/research/reports/fixed-rate-lending-market-structure
  DeFi lending held $28.5 billion in active loans, almost all at variable rates. Fira was the largest fixed-rate market at $430 million in active loans; Morpho Midnight reached $2 million by the end of August. Compares Morpho Midnight, Jupiter Offerbook, Term Finance, TermMax, Fira, Loopscale and Flex.
- The Renaissance of Onchain Options (July 2026, 95 pages, with Block Scholes): https://castlelabs.io/research/reports/renaissance-of-onchain-options
  Exchange-traded options volume exceeded futures by more than four times in 2024. Maps onchain options after DOVs: order books, AMMs, perpetual options and one-day BTC binaries on Kalshi, Polymarket and Hyperliquid.
- Real-World Assets: Bringing TradFi Onchain (June 2026, 85 pages): https://castlelabs.io/research/reports/real-world-assets
  Tokenised RWAs stood at $28.2 billion (peak $31.8 billion), but only about $3 billion, 10%, was active in DeFi. Tokenised public debt was over $17 billion and tokenised private credit $4.23 billion.
- The Full-Stack Privacy Ecosystem (June 2026, 64 pages): https://castlelabs.io/research/reports/full-stack-privacy
  About 4.9 million ZEC, close to 30% of supply, sat in shielded pools; Railgun passed $5 billion in shielded volume. Covers Zcash, Railgun, Arcium, Zama FHE and selective disclosure.
- The Vaultification of Finance (May 2026, 76 pages): https://castlelabs.io/research/reports/vaultification-of-finance
  Eight vault categories held $120.4 billion in net TVL; three curators held 75% of curated TVL; RWA vaults grew 37.8% in the stress window while every other category fell.
- The Evolution of Commodities (March 2026, 71 pages): https://castlelabs.io/research/reports/the-evolution-of-commodities
  Tokenised spot commodities reached $7.4 billion, mostly gold, and commodity perp open interest on Hyperliquid passed $1.4 billion as HIP-3 opened oil, metals and index markets.
- Perp DEX research hub: https://castlelabs.io/research/topics/trading
- Live perp DEX rankings by open interest and 24h volume, with a Binance comparison, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/perp-dex-rankings (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/perps.json)
- Live crypto revenue rankings, blockchains by fees and protocols by revenue, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/crypto-revenue-rankings (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/revenue.json)
- Hyperliquid revenue tracker, daily, 30-day and 12-month revenue with weekly and monthly charts, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/hyperliquid-revenue
- Bitcoin $100K odds, options-implied (Deribit) and Polymarket probabilities with the implied year-end price range, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/bitcoin-100k-odds
- Tokenized stocks list, largest tokenized stocks by market value, by company and by issuer, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/tokenized-stocks (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/tokenized-stocks.json)
- Hyperliquid Stats: Hyperliquid's volume, open interest, market share and revenue, how it compares with other perp DEXs, and Castle's research on it, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/hyperliquid (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/perps.json)
- Institutional Vaults and Curators: DeFi risk curators by assets managed, how much of each large Morpho vault is withdrawable now, redemption rules and custody routes, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/institutional-vaults (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/institutional-vaults.json)
- Morpho Stats: Morpho's deposits, loans, interest paid and chains, its largest vault curators, and Castle's research on it, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/morpho (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/morpho.json)
- Stablecoin Chains: Stablecoin supply by blockchain, 30-day growth, the USDT and USDC mix, and where Arc, Plasma and Tempo stand, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/stablecoin-chains (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/stablecoin-chains.json)
- RWA Yields Beyond Treasuries: Reinsurance, private credit and other RWA yield tokens by APY and size, against SOFR and the 13-week T-bill, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/rwa-yields (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/rwa-yields.json)
- Onchain Commodities: Oil, gold and silver perps on Hyperliquid by volume, open interest and funding, with the largest tokenized gold tokens, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/onchain-commodities (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/commodities.json)
- Pre-IPO Markets Onchain: Pre-IPO perps on Hyperliquid by volume, open interest, funding and implied valuation, with PreStocks tokens, updated daily: https://castlelabs.io/research/pre-ipo-markets (raw JSON: https://castlelabs.io/data/pre-ipo.json)
- Every Castle Labs dataset, with sources, update dates, raw JSON and how to cite it: https://castlelabs.io/research/data
- Glossary of DeFi and perp DEX terms, with full explainers on Hyperliquid HIP-3 and perp funding rates: https://castlelabs.io/research/glossary

## Podcast

- Castle Labs Podcast, live conversations with founders and researchers on perps, tokenised stocks, lending and onchain markets: https://castlelabs.io/podcast (YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@castle_labs)

## Research Topics

Castle Labs publishes research covering: DeFi, AI and crypto, trading and derivatives, Layer 2 networks, privacy protocols, market analysis and sentiment, regulation and compliance, prediction markets, and protocol deep dives.

## Clients

Castle Labs works with leading protocols and ecosystems including: Arbitrum, Starknet, Mantle, Berachain, GMX, Ink, Azuro, Almanak, Resolv, Curvance, Ondo and Variational.

## Key Facts

- 180+ research publications a year
- 7,000+ newsletter readers across Castle Labs research channels
- 2,500+ institutional readers across institutional finance, crypto-native trading, infrastructure, DeFi, RWAs, research, and media
- Saved $10M for Arbitrum DAO through research-backed governance analysis
- Newsletter open rate between 24-27%, above the industry average
- 35K Substack views and 22K unique opens delivered in the Arbitrum Unlocked 2.0 research campaign
- Research hub with full articles and free flagship report PDFs: https://castlelabs.io/research
- Full content index for LLMs: https://castlelabs.io/llms-full.txt
- Markdown copy of any article or report: add .md to its URL, for example https://castlelabs.io/research/reports/mapping-the-perpetual-trading-ecosystem.md
- RSS feed (full article content): https://castlelabs.io/feed.xml
- Weekly newsletter on Substack: https://research.castlelabs.io

## Team

Founded by Atomist and Francesco, the team includes researchers, strategists, and builders at the intersection of Traditional Finance and the Web3 ecosystem.

## Links

- Website: https://castlelabs.io
- About: https://castlelabs.io/about
- Services: https://castlelabs.io/services
- Research hub: https://castlelabs.io/research
- Research topics: https://castlelabs.io/research/topics/defi (also /trading /privacy /markets /predictions /l2s /ai /regulation /deep-dives)
- Contact: https://castlelabs.io/contact
- Twitter/X: https://x.com/castle_labs
- LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/company/castle-labs-io/
- Telegram: https://t.me/castlelabsreads
- Email: hello@castlelabs.io