Astros announced the launch of its perpetual futures decentralized exchange (DEX) on the Sui blockchain, marking a concerted push into the expanding derivatives segment of DeFi.

Astros emphasises that Sui’s performance and scalability create a strong foundation for derivatives trading infrastructure. As founder Jerry Liu remarked,

“Perp DEXs have become the ultimate litmus test for a blockchain’s ability to handle real financial infrastructure. Sui’s performance advantage gives us the foundation to compete at the highest level.”

According to the announcement, perpetual-futures DEXs now make up approximately 26% of the crypto-derivatives market and have reached a milestone of $1 trillion in monthly trading volume.

Astros highlights a key integration with NAVI Protocol, claiming access to $1 billion in lending capital to support liquidity for the DEX. Liu explained the model:

“Rather than relying on mercenary liquidity or unsustainable token emissions, Astros creates a self-reinforcing loop where trading activity generates real yield for lenders, and lending capital provides the liquidity depth traders demand.”

The platform also reports integrations with major wallets and trading platforms—including OKX, Binance, KuCoin, and Gate — to facilitate access for users on Sui.

From a broader ecosystem perspective, Astros’ entry signals a shift for Sui — from basic DeFi primitives like swapping and lending to full-blown derivatives infrastructure.

As the announcement stated: “Where DeFi 1.0 was defined by isolated lending and swapping protocols, Astros signals a shift toward integrated financial infrastructure where trading, lending and liquidity provision work as a unified system.”

Challenges ahead include securing deep liquidity, managing risk factors such as oracle and margin vulnerabilities, and differentiating amid competitive perpetual DEXs already operating in the market. For Astros and Sui, execution and adoption will ultimately determine their staying power in the trillion-dollar derivatives race.

Astro Enters a Competitive Arena

Astro’s launch is notable as it enters the race to capture a share of the perpetual futures market, currently valued at $1.22 trillion based on 30-day volume data from DeFiLlama.

Data published today shows that Hyperliquid, Lighter, and Aster dominate the market, recording volumes of $286.46 billion, $247 billion, and $207 billion, respectively, over the past 30 days.

The market has grown significantly since February 2021, when total volume stood at just $206,987. Its current valuation of $1.22 trillion highlights the sector’s rapid expansion and suggests more growth ahead, particularly as institutional investors and global participants continue to enter the space.

Following the announcement, SUI’s performance remained largely unchanged. The asset declined by 1.46% in the past 24 hours, with trading volume nearing $1 billion — an indication of strong sell pressure.