Decentralized cryptocurrency derivatives exchange Hyperliquid (HYPE) announced last week that it plans to launch its own native stablecoin, USDH.
Accordingly, Hyperliquid announced that it will hold an on-chain vote on the issuance of its stablecoin USDH. The selected project will win the right to issue a native USDH stablecoin compatible with Hyperliquid. Hyperliquid will provide the branding and USDH token, while the team selected through the vote will be responsible for the issuance and operations.
As anticipation for Hyperliquid’s USDH stablecoin continues, Ethena (ENA), the team behind the USDe synthetic dollar protocol, has announced that it has withdrawn its bid to issue Hyperliquid’s USDH stablecoin.
Ethena Labs has withdrawn its proposal to issue Hyperliquid’s USDH stablecoin, acknowledging concerns raised in direct conversations with community members and validators.
Ethena Labs founder Guy Young said that community concerns that Ethena was not a Hyperliquid-specific team, had other product lines, and did not limit its goals to a single partner exchange were valid, and therefore the proposal was withdrawn.
Ethena’s withdrawal marks a significant shift in the bidding process, which has already received bids from numerous teams to issue Hyperliquid’s upcoming native stablecoin, USDH.
With Ethena eliminated, prediction markets on Polymarket give Native Markets a 92% chance of winning, with Paxos in second place at around 7% at the time of writing.
Ultimately, Ethena’s withdrawal not only gave Native Markets the near-certain winner, but also highlighted the advantage local projects have in decentralized governance processes.
*This is not investment advice.