What Is Ondo Perps | The Equity Perp Exchange That Lets You Post Tokenized Stocks as Collateral

Want to trade US stocks like NVDA and Tesla around the clock without holding a brokerage account? Ondo Perps is an equity perp exchange, launched in July 2026, that answers that demand on-chain. As the name suggests, it is built by RWA leader Ondo Finance, and it handles collateral in a way that differs from other crypto perps.

👉 Check the latest supported assets and terms on the official site

Ondo Perps is an exchange that offers on-chain perps (perpetual futures) tracking US stocks, ETFs, indices, commodities, and crypto. You are not tied to weekday trading hours—you can trade any time, 24/7.

| Item | Details |

|---|---|

| Chain | On-chain (on its own execution layer, Ondo Network; connect with an EVM wallet) |

| Category | Equity perp exchange (perp DEX / RWA) |

| Stage | Publicly launched (July 7, 2026; early access) |

| Funding | Parent Ondo Finance raised a $20M Series A in April 2022 (led by Founders Fund and Pantera) |

| Availability | Not available to residents of the US, Canada, or Panama / no official statement for Japan = check for yourself |

Image: Screenshot of the Ondo Perps official site (captured July 28, 2026)

On July 8, the day after launch, the platform announced that cumulative trading volume had surpassed $2 billion. That is a strong start for a just-launched venue, but it is a cumulative total, and there is no guarantee the same momentum continues today.

The heart of Ondo Perps is a cross-collateral design that lets you post not just USDC but the tokenized stocks and ETFs you already hold as margin.

Most crypto perp exchanges limit collateral to stablecoins or a handful of cryptocurrencies. To use stocks as margin, you first have to sell them for cash, which puts you at a disadvantage in terms of upside and trading costs.

Ondo Perps connects to the tokenized-securities infrastructure of parent Ondo Finance, allowing you to use tokenized stocks you hold as margin at their mark-to-market value. For margin evaluation, it adopts a portfolio-margin approach that looks at the net risk of the entire account.

This is an attempt to reproduce on-chain an experience close to the prime brokerage of a traditional securities firm. Because you can post collateral without selling, capital efficiency improves.

That said, if the stock you posted as collateral falls while your position also moves against you, your margin ratio deteriorates all at once and liquidation draws near. You need to be more aware of this double price movement than with cash collateral.

Others are also going after on-chain equity trading, such as arcus, but the ability to use tokenized stocks you hold directly as collateral is Ondo Perps' distinctive edge. Advanced order types and 24/7 trading themselves are standard features for this kind of exchange.

Fees are 0.015% maker and 0.035% taker (i.e., 1.5 bps and 3.5 bps). As of the official API on July 28, 2026, nearly every asset was uniform (only INTC currently shows zero, which may be provisional).

Leverage is often described as "up to 20x," but in reality it ranges from 5x to 25x depending on the asset.

| Max leverage | Main assets |

|---|---|

| 25x | Gold (XAU), silver (XAG), US100, US500 |

| 20x | BTC, ETH, AAPL, QQQ, SPY, WTI crude oil |

| 10x | Many individual stocks such as NVDA, TSLA, META, MSFT, GOOGL, AMZN, COIN, HOOD |

The higher the leverage, the faster a small adverse move wipes out your margin. Gold and indices being usable up to 25x reflects their lower volatility; a higher multiple does not itself mean it is easier to use.

We confirmed 34 pairs of supported assets via the official API (as of July 28, 2026). Stocks are the core at more than 18 names, and it also covers ETFs, stock indices, commodities such as gold and crude oil, and the BTC/ETH cryptocurrencies.

Image: Screenshot of the Ondo Perps app (captured July 28, 2026)

Underpinning this execution is Ondo Network, the platform's own execution layer announced on July 27, 2026. It is designed to process orders quickly and privately in a TEE (trusted execution environment) while settling non-custodially on a public chain.

It advances the former Ondo Chain concept toward an execution focus, and Ondo Perps is its first live application.

👉 Check the actual order screen and fees in the app

The first thing to note is that the ONDO traded on exchanges is the governance token of parent company Ondo Finance and is separate from Ondo Perps' rewards. A token dedicated to Ondo Perps has not been announced as of July 2026, so this is not yet at the "airdrop confirmed" stage.

Three types of rewards are currently running: a weekly USDC reward proportional to trading volume, a referral reward you earn when the people you invite keep trading, and Ondo Points determined by trading volume and open interest.

The USDC reward has a first-week pool of $150,000, the pre-alpha rewards are said to total $3 million, and for referrals there is also mention of a 5% fee discount for the referred party.

The operator and team background is also material for gauging trust. Ondo Finance is the player that pushed the RWA field to a multi-billion-dollar scale; it has infrastructure for tokenized US Treasuries and stocks/ETFs and cites partnerships with JPMorgan and Mastercard.

Founder Nathan Allman passed away suddenly in May 2026, and former McKinsey partner Ian De Bode now serves as CEO. The very fact that it could ship a major product right after losing its founder can be read as a signal of organizational continuity.

| Item | Details |

|---|---|

| Operator | Ondo Global Panama Inc. (a Panama entity); non-custodial P2P |

| Current CEO | Ian De Bode (former McKinsey; took office May 2026) |

| Founder | Nathan Allman (former Goldman Sachs; founded Ondo in 2021 / passed away suddenly May 2026) |

| Investors | Founders Fund, Pantera, Coinbase Ventures, Wintermute, Tiger Global, and others |

The reason to use Ondo Perps right now lies not in expectations for an unannounced token but in the capital efficiency of posting tokenized stocks as collateral without selling them. A path to access NVDA or gold exposure 24/7 from regions that a US brokerage account does not reach is something general-purpose crypto perps do not offer.

At the same time, the parts where you should hold off on judgment are clear. Just three weeks after launch, multiple reward programs—such as the weekly USDC reward and Ondo Points—are running simultaneously.

As a result, we cannot yet separate out how much of the currently visible volume is real demand that would remain even without rewards. As material for comparison, we line it up against major on-chain perps using the same CoinGecko aggregation (July 28, 2026).

| Item | Ondo Perps | Hyperliquid | edgeX |

|---|---|---|---|

| Main underlying assets | Stocks, ETFs, indices, commodities + crypto | Mostly crypto | Mostly crypto |

| Collateral | USDC + tokenized stocks/ETFs | Crypto | Crypto |

| Listed pairs | 32 | 363 | 55 |

| 24h volume | ~$238M | ~$9.7B | ~$132M |

| Open interest | ~$58M | ~$10.7B | ~$324M |

In terms of volume scale, it is far behind Hyperliquid. Still, it is striking that Ondo Perps, with its small number of listed pairs, exceeds edgeX—which has more assets—in 24-hour volume.

Volume that is large relative to open interest is a sign of active trading that turns over in a short time, consistent with the boost from reward programs. That is exactly why whether this turnover remains after rewards thin out is the dividing line for assessing real demand.

Note that the listed-pair counts in the table above are on a CoinGecko basis and differ from the official-API measurement in the body (34 pairs) due to how they are tallied. Volume and open interest also move significantly intraday, so read the table above as a snapshot-time guide and check the latest figures on the official site or CoinGecko.

Here are the minimal steps to get started, on the premise of checking the behavior with a small amount first.

1. Prepare an EVM wallet and connect it at app.ondoperps.xyz (log in by signing; residents of the US/Canada/Panama are excluded).

2. Deposit collateral. In addition to USDC, you can use tokenized stocks/ETFs such as SPYon and QQQon directly as margin.

3. Trade perps on stocks, indices, commodities, and crypto. Because leveraged trading carries liquidation risk, first check the behavior with a small amount and low leverage.

4. Claim the weekly USDC reward and Ondo Points on the dashboard; sharing your referral link makes you eligible for the referral reward.

👉 Check eligible regions, liquidation terms, and the latest fees on the official site

The core of Ondo Perps is a capital efficiency that other crypto perps lack: the ability to post tokenized stocks as collateral without selling them. Before the presence or absence of a dedicated token, whether this usability takes root as real demand without rewards will determine its standing as an exchange.

Sources

1. PR Newswire (2026) — https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ondo-perps-launches-first-equity-perpetuals-platform-with-tokenized-stock-collateral-302819574.html

2. Ondo Perps official site (2026) — https://ondoperps.xyz/

3. Ondo Perps official API (2026) — https://api.ondoperps.xyz/v1/markets

4. CoinGecko (2026) — https://www.coingecko.com/en/exchanges/ondo-perps

5. CryptoTimes (2026) — https://www.cryptotimes.io/2026/07/27/ondo-launches-new-execution-network-for-institutional-trading/

6. airdrops.io (2026) — https://airdrops.io/ondo-perps/

7. Ondo Finance blog (2022) — https://ondo.finance/blog/ondo-raises-20m-in-series-a-investment-round-led-by-founders-fund-and-pantera-capital