GRVT

In 2022, Hong Yea, Matthew Quek and Aaron Ong founded GRVT as a hybrid exchange that separates performance from trust: orders match offchain for speed while settlement happens onchain to preserve self-custody.

GRVT runs on a ZKsync Validium appchain, using zero-knowledge proofs to verify each trade and anchor it to Ethereum while keeping order data offchain to block front-running and sandwich attacks.

In December 2024, GRVT obtained a Class M digital asset business license from the Bermuda Monetary Authority, becoming the first regulated DEX, and launched its mainnet alpha.

GRVT's mainnet alpha went live in January 2025 and traded $1.3 billion in its first month; in August 2025 it dropped mandatory KYC so users could trade self-custodially with only an email, and in November it launched the GLP vault, drawing $1.8 million in 24 hours.

On September 18, 2025, GRVT closed a $19 million Series A co-led by ZKsync and Further Ventures with EigenCloud and 500 Global participating, for about $34 million raised in total.

In Q1 2026, GRVT processed roughly $131 billion, with cumulative volume past $393 billion and TVL of $484 million; on July 30, 2026, the GRVT token generation event completed with a fixed one-billion supply used for fee discounts, yield tiers and priority access.

TGE and listings: GRVT held its TGE on July 30, 2026 (delayed from the initially planned July 21), with the airdrop allocation at 28% of total supply. Spot trading went live on KuCoin and Bybit, perpetuals listed on Binance, HTX and Bitget, and KRW pairs launched on Upbit on August 5, driving a 31% single-day surge on August 10.

Value accrual and unlocks: The official tokenomics state that protocol economic surplus will fund systematic GRVT buybacks via TWAP and opportunistic market buys, though without a mandatory burn clause. Total supply is fixed at 1 billion tokens with only about 11.4% circulating. The airdrop vests over 12 months (40% released at TGE), and roughly 73.63 million tokens are set to unlock around November 29, 2026 — about 64% of the circulating supply — the biggest supply test to date.

Platform metrics: As of March 2026, TVL was about $484 million and cumulative volume exceeded $393 billion (The Block). In September, GRVT had about 30,900 holders, ranking third among newer perp DEX tokens, and the team published a new nine-tier fee model on September 17; OKX launched a GRVT staking campaign on August 20.

GRVT held its token generation event at 13:00 UTC on July 30, 2026, with a fixed supply of 1 billion tokens, 280 million allocated to two seasons of community airdrops (100 million and 180 million), releases spread over 12 months and registration open until August 6. GRVT/USDT opened at 14:00 UTC the same day on KuCoin, Bitget and Bybit, with MEXC starting earlier at 12:03 UTC and Coinbase only enabling deposit addresses.

The GRVT team says nearly $400 billion has traded since launch in December 2024, with over 100,000 wallets and no security incidents. The venue runs on a Validium Layer 2 built with the ZKsync ZK Stack, settling to Ethereum while keeping trade data off public chains to protect orderflow privacy; after the TGE it plans stable-funding perpetuals and unified-margin RWA vaults. The GRVT token provides fee discounts, better margin efficiency and priority access to new products.

GRVT is not trying to be another perpetual DEX but to turn unified margin into a capital flywheel: Earn puts idle stablecoins to work through Aave and prime brokerage lending, Trade covers more than 80 RWA perpetual markets across equities, FX and commodities, and Invest and Pay close the loop, so more productive deposits deepen liquidity and improve execution. Against trading-only venues such as Hyperliquid and Lighter, and RWA platforms that distribute but do not collateralise yield, GRVT bets on the users in between; ZKsync's Atlas upgrade, with one-second ZK finality and cross-chain interoperability, is the technical precondition. Whether the token captures value depends on the four layers really sharing one balance.

Hong Yea, Co-founder and CEO: BA in Business Administration from Yonsei University; formerly an associate at Credit Suisse Hong Kong and an executive director at Goldman Sachs Hong Kong; she co-founded GRVT with Aaron Ong and Matthew Quek in July 2022 and leads overall strategy and governance. Aaron Ong, Co-founder and CTO: formerly a tech lead in Meta's data privacy organisation and a DeFi engineering lead at Sea and Cronos Labs; he joined GRVT at founding in 2022, leads the design and implementation of its off-chain matching engine and settlement architecture, and heads the engineering team. Matthew Quek, Co-founder and COO: BA in Political Science and Computer Science from Columbia University; formerly led DBS Bank's blockchain and payments team and worked on Singapore's national digital identity programme; he co-founded GRVT in 2022 and oversees compliance, operations and regional coordination. The three founders split strategy, engineering and operations, with members drawn from investment banking, big tech and bank blockchain units.

GRVT prices perpetual futures across nine 30-day volume tiers: at Level 1 the maker fee is -0.0001% (a rebate) and the taker fee 0.045%, while at Level 9, from $1 billion in volume, the maker fee is -0.0030% and the taker fee 0.0240%.

GRVT applies the same nine-tier structure to spot: Level 1 charges makers 0.0600% and takers 0.0850%, with the taker fee at 0.0250% in the $1 billion tier.

GRVT charges flat withdrawal fees by chain: 2 USDT on Ethereum, 1.01 USDT each on Arbitrum and BNB Smart Chain, 1.5 USDT on Solana and 1.4 USDT on Tron.

In December 2024, GRVT obtained a Class M digital asset business licence from the Bermuda Monetary Authority as a digital asset derivative exchange provider, letting it run a regulated hybrid perpetuals venue for selected corporate clients.