Velar PerpDex Launches Perpetual Trading on Bitcoin L2 Stacks

Velar PerpDEX Launches Bitcoin Perpetual Trading on Stacks L2

Velar has launched the first decentralized perpetual exchange (PerpDEX) secured by Bitcoin for onchain future trading. The DEX unlocks leveraged futures trading on the original cryptocurrency – BTC – via Stacks, the leading Bitcoin Layer 2.

Announcing the launch of the DEX at perpdex.velar.com, Velar CEO Mithil Thakore expressed the goal to build the “core trading infrastructure that keeps users and liquidity on Bitcoin.” Thakore predicted Velar’s PerpDEX would be a “defining milestone” for DeFi on Bitcoin.

The first perpetual trading pair available on Velar is sBTC-USDh. USDh, developed by Hermetica, is the first synthetic stablecoin on Bitcoin pegged to the US-dollar, while sBTC is the ticker for Stacks’ Bitcoin-pegged asset.

Additional trading pairs will be rolled out on Velar’s new DEX over time, enabling users to open leveraged long and short positions in the Stacks L2 ecosystem. The Velar PerpDex arrives with a broad suite of trading features right out of the gate, offering deep liquidity, five-second block times, true decentralization, and Bitcoin finality.

Stacking Decentralized Finance on Bitcoin

DeFi on Bitcoin (BTCFi) is creating a raft of new financial opportunities in blockchain by leveraging Bitcoin’s security, decentralization, and market dominance as the world’s leading cryptocurrency. Stacks makes Bitcoin a fully programmable asset through its Layer 2 without altering the fundamentals of the Bitcoin base layer. 

Velar joins a growing list of projects on Stacks, unlocking billions in latent capital available on the Bitcoin network. Stacks empowers DeFi through its network of partners and collaborators, with yield-bearing assets and borrowing and lending facilities among its many offerings.

Projects building on Stacks include Gamma, an NFT and Ordinals marketplace; and .locker, a domain name and digital identity service for the Bitcoin network. The ecosystem also has a foothold in the GameFi sector through Force Prime, a web3 gaming platform.

Stacks delivered its Nakamoto upgrade in October of 2024, enabling faster transaction throughput and the much-anticipated launch of sBTC. The network continues to expand and offer new functionality at a rapid pace. 

Blockchair, the universal block explorer, announced its Stacks explorer on March 1, bringing powerful search and analytics features to the chain.

Perps Heats Up

The perpetuals market is now a cornerstone of crypto trading, representing billions in daily trading volume. Unlike traditional futures contracts, perpetuals have no fixed expiration date, allowing traders to hold positions indefinitely providing they can maintain margin requirements. These features make perpetuals a favorite among cryptocurrency traders, aligning with the “always on” nature and ethos of the wider market.

Hermetica CEO Jakob Schillinger, whose US-dollar stablecoin (USDh) offers up to 25% yield, emphasized the critical importance of perpetual trades for the future of the wider BTCFi movement. “Perpetual trading is one of the most important products in crypto,” said Schillinger, “and now thanks to Velar, it’s finally possible on Bitcoin.”

Velar’s perpetual trading DEX joins its existing suite of trading services, allowing its users to trade their favourite Bitcoin-related tokens including Velar (VELAR) and Stacks (STX) from a single place.