Kinetiq, a liquid staking protocol built around Hyperliquid’s HYPE token, has seen an explosion of inflows in recent weeks as users pile in to farm the protocol’s airdrop points campaign.
Total value locked (TVL) on Kinetiq has jumped from roughly $458 million in mid-July to over $2.1 billion today, according to DefiLlama.
While part of the increase can be attributed to a 20% rise in the price of HYPE over the same period, another big driver has been raw deposits. The amount of HYPE staked has climbed from under 10 million tokens in July to nearly 40 million now. Kinetiq’s points program opened mid-July, underscoring that it is driving activity in its ecosystem.
The surge demonstrates the growing influence of Hyperliquid, which is fast becoming a DeFi heavyweight as liquidity, trading activity and staking demand migrate onto its ecosystem.
Points programs in particular, where protocols distribute future token allocations to early participants, continue to pull in yield-hungry crypto investors. By staking HYPE through Kinetiq, users not only earn standard staking rewards but also accumulate points toward a potential Kinetiq token airdrop.
For many DeFi traders, that double yield opportunity has proven irresistible, some have shared on X.
Read more: Native Markets Leads Early Voting for Hyperliquid’s USDH Stablecoin Contract